


With the Wind

by Hoshiisayaka3



Category: One Piece
Genre: Abandonment, Alternate Universe, Arlong is suprisingly reasonable, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Male-Female Friendship, Multi, Past Child Abuse, Post-Timeskip, Stalking, complete self indulgence, phantom thief, some stupid thievery adventures besides the plot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:46:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 66,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26560876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hoshiisayaka3/pseuds/Hoshiisayaka3
Summary: Traveling all over the Grandline, carried by the wind, there is nothing the mysterious Fishman Phantom Thief Kagami cannot steal. With the use of her prediction and calculation and also unexplainable powers she is a thorn in the governments eyes for 5 years now. Stealing from the nobles,  mocking the Marine and always making a miraculous escape.Everything goes effortless for her until one day she announced to steal something from Impel Down. Down there she meets fellow Fishmen, who were imprisoned there, starting to give her life of graceful thievery an interesting twist.
Kudos: 8





	1. The Mysterious Thief appears

**Author's Note:**

> I love Fishmen and they deserve more appreciation so I'll give it them. And because I also love Phantom Thieves, this story's protagonist is one.  
> Let the shenanigans begin.

The shining moon was looking down on the entire Grandline enlightening the night sky with its mysterious light. Such mysterious light was the perfect stage for a certain thief, who sneaked in a tower to steal its owner‘s precious treasure, the Sapphire Sculpure. They made it already to the top of the roof and saw how a crowd stood around the tower to watch the spectacle. The thief didn‘t move, they just stood there basically waiting for the navy to come and corner them.

„You‘re surrounded! Give up and return the sculpture, you burglar!“

The marines ordered but the thief just shook their head with their short but voluminous ash gray hair, that looked like nothing in the world could tame it. With slightly boredom in their deep purple eyes they just returned: „Nope, I don‘t think so because I‘m not a burglar.“

„Then you are a dirty pirate fishwoman!“ One marine yelled at the thief, obviously mad at her disrespect.  
The fishwoman decided, that arguing with these stupid human marines would be a waste of time so she decided to come to the main part.

„Ngahahahaha!“ She laughed loud and wholeheartedly with her arms wide open, the treasure in one of her silver gloved and webbed hands, widening out her blue cape, that was cyan on the inner side.  
„Ladies and gentlemen! I hope you are all enjoying today’s show with me the glorious thief, stealing the treasure and the marine again desperately tying to catch me, never understanding, that they‘ll never get me no matter how many men they sent, they‘re just too stupid!“

The crowd started laughing, amused by her mocking the authorities. That was the final drop for the marines and they started running towards her. She didn‘t care about around 40 soldiers attacking her. She just dodged each and every one of them with ease, looking graceful in her ultramarine sleeveless tailed tuxedo and long black boots, almost as she was dancing.

As one of them tried to shoot her, he was shocked when the bullet just went though her. She jumped in front of him, showing her grayish brown skin and her emerald green necklace with a light green stone center. Since she belongs to the species of the fishmen, her body frame was curvy and feminine but not petite and she wasn‘t small. With her 210 cm, she was looking down on the soldier with a sharp-toothed grin.

„I know you were going to do this. You simple people are just so predictable.“  
As he tried to shoot her again she just used him as a springboard to jump to the very edge of the building's roof. Illuminated by the mysterious moonlight, she looked at the marines through her stylish orange mask with golden zig-zag frame and crimson center, two ash grey wisps of her hair in front of it.

„Everything went just as announced and planned. You guys were no challenge, it was almost boring.“ She mocked them with a calm and confident smile on her face.  
„Stop these stupid games burglar, pirate fishwoman or whatever! Just let us arrest you.“

Compleatly ignoring the orders she looked to the sky, calmly saying to herself:  
„What a nice, cold wind this night...“

Suddenly she trembled, panicked trying to regain balance. Everyone gasped as they thought, she was going to fall. But shortly after that, she just stood there again like nothing happened with her arms behind her back, grinning widely: „Juuuuust kidding. Well then...goodbye.“

Briefly adjusting the silver buttons, that hold her cape together under her silver dress shirt and then jumping from the edge, falling down with the head forward.  
„Aaahhhh, is this burglar pirate going to kill herself?!“ One marine yelled in panic.

During the fall, the thief responded: „My gosh, how many times do I have to tell you, that I‘m not a burglar nor I‘m a pirate...“

Right before she would have crashed into the ground with full force, she was suddenly surrounded by a small tornado, catapulting her up into the sky, able to saw everyone from above. Illuminated by the mysterious, shining moonlight she finished her explanation:

„I am Phantom Thief Kagami! Ngahahahahaha!“

With that said she flew away, escaping victorious into the night sky.

Three days later in the office of Hannyabal, the warden of Impel Down, the most secure prison in the world, the chubby warden read the newspaper, slightly annoyed by today’s cover:  
„Mysterious Phantom Thief Kagami, strikes again! The marine‘s chanceless!“

He slammed his fist against his desk in anger.  
„Wretched Kagami! She steals and steals, humiliating all nobles and the world government! Why can‘t they just catch her?! She must be stopped and locked down here in Level 6, no matter how pretty she is!“  
He heard the door knocking and answered, that they can come in.

It was the former warden, the enormous Magellan, who came in to inform Hannyabal about the card in his hand. He told him that it was just blown here by the wind. The warden took the card and realized, that it certainly wasn‘t a normal card. He looked at the recto, that was orange and bright yellow striped with a golden zig-zag frame and a familiar crimson symbol in the center. But the most obvious part was, that the recto had an in silver written „Kagami“ on it.

„Damn it! It‘s an Advance Notice!“ The warden cursed and turned the Notice around to see the backside, which was cyan with a dark blue frame and a big silver „K“ and he read the text written on it:

Advance Notice  
Tonight under the shining moon I‘m coming for Impel Down‘s Platinum Emblem, to steal it from warden Hannyabal with skill and grace.  
Phantom Thief Kagami

Kagami always sent Advance Notice before a heist, to announce to the treasure owner what she was going to do.

„This can be quite a problem when suddenly a phantom thief comes here to steal something and escapes. Our reputation already suffers after the great prison break happened two years ago.“  
The vice warden suggested.

„I know that Magellan! And that‘s why we must be certain to catch and arrest her here! Make it public! This is going to be big news, since she is a troublemaker for five years now.“ Hannyabal ordered.  
„Sure can I do that.“ Magellan responded calmly.  
„But we have to be careful, you know, that her powers are mysterious and unexplained like everything else on her, a total wildcard, that should never be underestimated. She isn‘t called Wildcard Kagami and has a bounty of 180 million Berry for nothing.“  
„Exactly! We clearly must think everything through and catch that dare-devil! We must focus on the prison‘s inside and not the barriers because, if there is something we know about her is, that she can infiltrate everything without any problem as long as the tiniest air hole exists.“  
  
The night of the heist has arrived and the entirety of Impel Down was on higher alert since the thief could arrive at any second.  
At the monitor room all the officers looked closely at the monitors to not miss her.  
„Is it just me or is did someone open the door? Because I suddenly feel a shivering air draft.“ One of the guards asked and everyone turned around but the door was still shut. They hadn‘t much time to wonder about the sudden air draft because a little tornado appeared in the room, throwing all guards around the room, knocking them out and destroying the control panel.

The tornado seemed to mumble something:  
„Ngahaha...have fun locating me now, folks. So for the treasure in the warden‘s office, I have to reach Level 4. Piece a cake but maybe I should stop moving around in this form, when I have arrived at least Level 2, or everything‘ll be too easy and I want to have some fun here.“  
With that, the tornado became wind gust and slipped through the keyhole, the same way, it came in.

It didn‘t take long for the wind gust to arrive Level 2. There were no complications, since it was invisible and flew over the heads of the guards. Right before the entrance, the wind gust formed itself into a small tornado again but quickly manifests into something different. The new form was Kagami, who infiltrated the prison without problems as usual. She smiled relaxed and began to walk with her gloved hands into her pants pocket.  
„Game Start.“  
  
The phantom thief walked through the halls like it‘s a peaceful walk through the shopping district on Fishman Island. Absolutely careless, could someone think. But she was inspecting the place to every small detail including the cells. Level 1 and 2 clearly lost an amount of prisoners since the great break out. The prisoners observed her closely, recognizing Kagami.  
„Hey, isn‘t this this famous thief?!“  
„Yes, it‘s Kagami!“  
„Did she come to steal anything?“  
„Wow, she is sooo pretty even for a fishwoman.“

And other things, some of them even begged her to let them out but she just ignored them. These humans would only be in her way, she had no reason to help them.

Soon she arrived the part of Level 2, where the lone cells were for troublemakers. These were more interesting for her and so she looked at the inmates, analyzing them closely.

A few cells later she saw a tall and muscular inmate, who caught her attention because he was also a fishman. He was chained with seastone chains, his uniform was slightly torn, exposing his entire upper body. Maybe he just returned from torture and the guards didn‘t give him a new uniform yet. He looked down so she couldn‘t see much of him except his long messy black hair, dorsal fin and his light blue-skin.  
„Hey, you.“ Kagami called for him and he finally looked up with the most annoyed glance in his fierce light-blue eyes, there is.  
She easily found out, that he was a saw shark fishman according to his long, saw-shaped nose.

„What is soooo important, that you have to talk to me human woman!?“ He spat in his deep voice.  
„Hey, no misunderstandings here.“ She told him, showing her arms with small round ray wings on the side of her lower arms and her pointy tail with some more spikes on the end.  
„I‘m a fishman like you, a feathertail stingray to be exact.“

As he heard that, his disgust was gone and he was just surprised. He took a closer look on her and recognized her as Kagami.  
„What does a famous thief here in a high security prison?“ He asked her.  
„Stealing treasure of course. Why else should I be here, duh?“ She responded smiling and jokingly tapping on her forehead.  
„You‘re Arlong the Saw am I right?“  
She asked rhetorically because even he was aware, that she knew the answer herself already because she most likely saw his Jolly Roger on his left lower arm. Every fishman, who should be an adult right at this point knew about the Arlong Pirates but the shark called Arlong just nodded in agreement.

„Just as I thought.“ Kagami told him. „A phantom thief should always be well informed so I know, why you are currently locked down here. But that doesn‘t matter right now. What matters is the tattoo on your chest.“  
Arlong was quite surprised, that she mentioned his Sun Pirate symbol and asked, what her deal with it was. Suddenly Kagami made an unexpected serious face:  
„You were a member of the Sun Pirates, the most amazing people to ever exist, so before I make an important decision, I have one question for you and I want your most honest answer.“  
Despite his confusion from Kagami‘s weird behavior he listened closely…

„What is Fisher Tiger for you?“

Arlong didn‘t need to think long to answer her question about his thoughts of his deceased big brother:  
„He was the best person to ever live…A symbol and hero of the fishmen especially for the ones from the Fishman District like me. I owe him everything, my life, my family, just everything! My respect and admiration for him knows no limits and I‘ll fight everyone, who dares to talk bad about him!“

This was everything Kagami needed to know. She smiled again and gave him some news:  
„And that‘s the correct answer! Time to get you out of here.“

„Ah, okay nice….wait?! What?!“ Arlong asked in complete shock about, what he just heard. A thief, who came here just to steal treasure wants to free him?!  
„Yup, it was really touching, what you just said. I deeply respect you Sun Pirates, you were symbols of freedom and power, especially Fisher Tiger. I just cannot let such amazing people here to rot away. That‘s why I‘m going to get you out now.“

„You‘re sure you‘re able to make a prison break happen and steal the treasure all by yourself?“ Arlong joked with a sharp-toothed smirk.  
Kagami‘s expression however went from friendly to pissed and she turned around, ready to go:  
„Hmpf, when you have doubts about my abilities, I can just let you here and focus on my treasure. Have a nice prison life and bye-bye.“  
„Eyy, wait I was joking! Of course I don‘t doubt you! Get back here and get me out of this shithole!“ Arlong yelled at her, not wanting her to leave.  
Then she turned her head around, again with her typical smirk:  
„Ngahaha, now we‘re talking!“  
This was, when Arlong realized, that she was just a troll…

Kagami stood in front of the cell lock and put the tip of her ray tail into the key hole, twisting a bit in it.  
The shark watched how focused she was and was clearly fascinated about how she tried to open the lock with her tail. Shortly later it made a quiet „click“ and the cell door really opened.  
She then walked to Arlong, to remove the cuffs on him with the same trick.

It was the first time they could look at each other closely, Kagami noticed, that he wasn‘t really the youngest anymore with a few wrinkles around his mouth but she didn‘t say anything, she was more focused on removing the cuffs. Arlong on the other hand noticed some dark blue marks under both of her eyes, two pointy lines on both of them, were these tattoos?  
She was good-looking, maybe Kuroobi would like her...so from ray to ray.

„Click.“ And now the cuffs were gone, too. Arlong, clearly thankful, stood up stretching a bit and said to her with a genuine kind smile: „Thanks girl, I owe you one.“  
„You‘re welcome, no problem.“ She responded relaxed. „Now, then...Treasure!“  
„Wait a sec!“ Arlong interrupted her.

„There is something really important I need to do before I leave and for this I need your tail trick.“  
„Uh, and that is?“ The stingray asked curious.  
„My friends Kuroobi and Chew are locked down in Level 1 and I‘ll never leave without them so please go back with me to save them!“  
He was full on serious about this, Kagami could sense this. She liked people, who would never leave their friends behind so she was eager to help him. When Arlong heard this he just smiled but was really, really happy and was clearly looking forward to be reunited with his beloved brothers.

And so they turned back to Level 1, to rescue Arlong‘s friends. On the way, while ignoring the humans begging them to let them out Arlong came up with a question he had in his mind since he knew about Kagami:  
„So you are a professional burglar right?“  
„I‘m not a burglar! I‘m a phantom thief!“ Kagami scuffed, looking up at him, clearly annoyed.  
„So is that a different version of a pirate?“  
„Argh, are you teasing me?!“ She really didn‘t like hearing these things. „I‘m also not a pirate! I‘m a phantom thief! P-H-A-N-T-O-M T-H-I-E-F!“  
„So would you explain me, where the difference is?“ Arlong asked, raising an eyebrow.

„Oh, there is a big difference!“ She loves explaining her profession so she placed her fists on her hips, and told him proud:  
„A phantom thief doesn‘t steal things quietly. They give proper advance notice! This makes an honest test of skill between the phantom thief and the owner. A fair challenge!“  
„Uhhh, that‘s some logic, but I think I buy it.“ Arlong answered, rubbing the back of his head.  
„You need to have lots of skill and confidence to successfully steal despite public announcement. Neat, I like fishmen with skill. I also heard, that you only steal from rich human, that‘s cool! Show these filthy humans, what we fishmen are made off!“

The praise of Arlong‘s side made her blush in pride and she grinned widely.  
„Ngahaha, I‘m pretty cool aren‘t I?“ Kagami boasted her ego, adjusting her orange mask.  
„Yeah, showing these corrupt shitheads, that they‘re no better than regular humans. Toying with them is one reason why I love thievery so much.“  
Indeed, Arlong really started to like this woman. She caught his interest and he wanted to know more about her.

„Sooo...what are the other reasons?“  
„Sorry, dude but I‘m not telling you.“ She answered, smiling with her tongue out.  
„What?! Why?!“ He asked, not understanding.  
„Tsk, tsk.“ Kagami made with her finger shaking in her webbed glove. „I‘m a phantom thief. I‘m supposed to be mysterious. And I can‘t be that when I‘m just telling strangers everything about me, no matter, if we get along or not.“

Arlong was clearly disappointed by this answer but Kagami wasn‘t finished yet:  
„There is at least one thing I can tell you. My profession means to live my life free. Don‘t let anything or anyone tie you down. Risk your life for what you love. That‘s what it means to be a phantom thief.“  
„Risk your life for what you love...“ Arlong repeated, understanding this ideology.

They arrived at Level 1 and he started calling for his friends:  
„Yo, Chew! Kuroobi! Where are you guys, It‘s me Arlong!“  
Kagami gave him a little punch in the stomach, lecturing him:  
„I know you want to see your buddies and we‘re going to encounter the guards anyway but that‘s not the graceful way of infiltration.“  
„Well, that‘s the pirate way. Straight forward.“ The shark made clear and the stingray sighed until they heard the guards rushing to them.  
Arlong walked in front of Kagami getting ready to crush them.

„I heard, that the guards up here are too weak to deal with Level 2 inmates! This is going to be fun! I wanted to smash some humans for a while now, shahahahaha!“  
But before he could face the guards Kagami interrupted him and stepped forward herself.  
„Let me do it Arlong. That‘s faster.“ She told him, stretching out her left hand and clenching it into a fist.

„Air Blast!“

And as she opened it a sudden blast of gust was unleashed with an exploding sound. Blowing all the guards and even many of the inmates in their cells away, knocking them all unconscious.  
„Oh, sorry you guys in the cells. You were conveniently in the way...ngahahaha...“ The thief apologized embarrassed.

Arlong was flabbergasted by this performance, how easy Kagami blasted them all away in one shot, even parts of the ground were ripped out from this.  
„What an amazing power...“ He said to himself until he realized, that Kagami already walked further forward and brought him back to reality with:  
„Come on man! Do you want to save your friends or growing roots?“ With a comedic grin on her face.

They walked through the hallway, Arlong calling for his friends and Kagami watching the inmates being clearly terrified of them. Soon they heard responses and ran to the cell they came from.  
Right in front of them stood a light gray-skinnied manta ray fishman with long straight black hair and a smelt-whiting fishman with bright-blue skin, short dark blonde hair and thick lips, Kuroobi and Chew.  
„Yo, Arlong you really managed to get out!“ Kuroobi cheered in joy.

„Oh, who‘s the lady ray next to you? I‘m pretty sure I‘ve seen her on a bounty once, chuu...“ Chew asked.  
„Oh, this is Kagami the famous phantom thief. She‘s totally fine. She helped me to get out and now she‘s going to help you, too.“  
„Indeed, now step aside and let me do the thing.“ She ordered relaxed and went to the lock, doing her tail trick.

The two imprisoned fishmen were fascinated to see the famous thief in person, here to help them. They never had the chance to see her before because she never showed up in their part of the East Blue, there were just no corrupt rich humans to steal from…  
The anticipation was big as they watched her trying to open the lock. But not just the fishmen, the humans, who shared the cell with the two wanted to get out as well. When Arlong saw this he just smirked malicious.

„Click“  
The lock opened and Chew and Kuroobi could step out. But before others could do as well Arlong closed the door and it was locked again.  
When the inmates complained, Arlong just responded delighted:  
„Shahahaha! You really think I‘ll let you out of here, filthy humans?! When the prison break two years ago occurred, the human, who freed all of the inmates, didn‘t open mine on purpose so sucks to be you guys!“  
One of the inmates, frightened to stay there forever asked Kagami:  
„Hey, you girl! You opened the door so would you help us out of here or at least me?!“  
Kagami just answered this with a tired expression and her hands behind her head:  
„Nope, not really. You know I just did that in the first place because this dude here asked me for a favor...“ Nodding to Arlong  
And so they headed forward.

Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew, eager to be in freedom again wanted to head towards exit but were stopped by Kagami:  
„Do you really think, this is a good idea?“ She asked rhetorically. „I mean during the great prison break, there were multiple Level 5 inmates and even the so called Blackbeard-Crew involved. So I suggest to follow me instead because I have thought of a safe escape route.“  
„Sure thing but aren‘t you going deeper into the prison, where the exit is not?“ Kuroobi asked perplex.  
„Of, course because a phantom thief will not leave until the treasure is stolen. And for this I have to go to the warden‘s office in Level 4.“

„Level 4?!“ They repeated shocked.  
„Indeed, Level 4. but this won‘t be a problem for me at all even with you as company. I have a plan. So are you coming with me? Not that you really have a choice...“  
After thinking briefly this through, they came to the conclusion, that it really was the best and safe way to escape, to follow her even if it meant going deeper into this hellhole.  
„Don‘t worry brothers, I‘m pretty sure this is going to end well!“ Arlong cheered optimistic.

„As long as we stay on Kagami‘s side and stay on guard! You know, even if I just know her for a bit more than 20 minutes, I can say she is really strong!“  
„Ngahaha, I can‘t deny that.“ Kagami agreed prideful. „You know, this little explosion you heard, that was me. I just took care of the guards at once.“  
„Wow, you must be pretty good at Fishman-Karate...“ Kuroobi guessed.  
„Uuuhh, yeah well, I do know Fishman-Karate, it‘s quite decent. But for this, I used something else...“

„Your devil fruit powers am I right?“ Arlong continued with this question.  
„Ding-dong you‘re right!“ Kagami approved. „Since you‘re going to see my skills anyway I can just tell you, what my devil fruit power is. I‘m using the Storm-Storm Fruit (Arashi-Arashi no Mi), a logia-type devil fruit, that gives me the ability to conjure, manipulate and become wind.“

With that she uses her ability to become wind, which is actually just moving air, to infiltrate everything as long as the tiniest air hole exists and being immune to every non-haki attacks since shooting or punching air is useless. Also she has the ability to fly, by letting the wind carry her and she can blow enemies away by creating strong blasts of gust, an attack called Air Blast.  
That was the explanation Kagami gave to them as tiny crash course into her logia powers.

„And these are just the basics. Wind is very versatile to use, so I can do many cool things with it. This is why nobody had ever a chance of catching me, ngahahahaha!“ Kagami finished.  
Clearly impressed they stared at the mysterious and also quite powerful thief, but Kuroobi was worried about one thing:  
„But isn‘t it quite problematic, that you can‘t swim anymore. I mean there is a reason why Vander Decken IX is the only known fishman devil fruit user out there, this guy isn‘t sane.“

„Oh, don‘t come to false conclusions.“ Kagami demanded. „I can swim.“

„What?!“ The guys couldn‘t belive, what they just heard. Kagami just broke the rules of devil fruit users.  
„But this should be completely impossible!“ Chew objected. „You must be cursed, there is no other way! So why, chuu?“

Kagami just had a smug grin as she heard this.  
„And this is why I‘m called a wildcard. The marine can‘t explain this eighter and this is why on my bounty stands Only Alive. They want to investigate this weird phenomenon. I just love doing impossible things! But you know guys, because I like you so much, I‘ll give you a hint. I am a devil fruit user but I‘m also not.“

„Stop talking in riddles!“ The fishmen yelled at her even more confused now and she had fun teasing them.

„Anyway...“ Kagami started to get back to the point. „Just follow me. With you guys on my side I can‘t just go through everything in my logia form. After all I have to watch after you, but I don‘t mind at all. I was tired of making everything so easy for myself anyway, this could be a neat challenge. I like myself some handicaps.“ She smirked.

„Would you not call us a handicap!?“

Now the four fishmen were on the way back to Level 2, the Wild Beast Hell, ready for a great heist and a second prison break.


	2. Wake up, Get up, Get out there!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The heist and breakout of Impel Down continues and Kagami is ready to impress her companions more with her wind logia powers.

Arlong wasn‘t quite comfortable with the situation he and his brothers were in.  
They were currently on Level 2 of Impel Down, where a Jail Beast could appear anytime and their only defense was a self- claimed phantom thief, who was to describe it in one word: unpredictable.  
  
He never had a clue, what was going on in her mind.  
She was a troll, talked in riddles, was proud of her weird profession and very confident, almost arrogant.  
But this confidence was clearly justified because of her unexplainable, strong wind logia powers. The way she blasted away dozens of Blugori guards and even inmates in their cells by just opening her palm was incredible.  
It was really terrifying and he was relieved that this wildcard was on his side.  
  
Usually he didn‘t trust everyone immediately, even if they were a fishman. But in her case it was different. She freed him because of his former occupation as a Sun Pirate and his respect for Fisher Tiger.  
Arlong also was quite fond of, that she shared the same respect as well.  
And she just agreed to help his friends as well without demanding something back in return, was this just genuine kindness? He didn‘t know.  
But he trusted her, even if he knew, that he was basically forced to trust her in the moment.  
  
She said, that she has a safe escape route but for this.They had to follow her down to Level 4 with including passing Level 2 and 3.  
  
Even if he hated to admit it but he was sure he wouldn‘t come through Level 3 and that he wouldn‘t have had no chance against the vice warden Magellan.  
Just the thought alone knowing to be inferior to a dirty human in terms of power made Arlong‘s blood boil. But after losing to the rubber bastard, he used his time in imprisonment to think things through. He lost against him because he wasn‘t as strong anymore as he once was due to the lack of tough battles in eight years. He got rusty. But he was still sure the entire time, he was going to crush him and in the end he was crushed himself. Because he underestimated his enemy and overestimated himself. After that he vowed to himself to never be cocky again.  
  
His mixed bag train of thoughts about Kagami and the vow he made to himself was interrupted when Kagami suddenly stopped walking and just stayed still in place.  
  
„What‘s wrong Kagami-san? Why did you stop?“ Chew asked confused.  
„Three Jailer Beasts are coming near us. I sensed that.“  
The thief answered calmly and not worried at all about those monstrous creatures.  
  
„Wait you sensed that?! Does that mean you used the so called...“ Kuroobi guessed.  
„Observation haki? Yes, I can use it. Just one thing a phantom thief should be able to use.“  
She told them like it was nothing.  
  
After all in the New World it‘s rather common and she steals all around the Grandline so she‘s active there as well.  
  
Just as she predicted, the three beasts stood in front of them, Sphinx, Basiliisk and Manticores ready to kill the fishmen.  
However Kagami gave her companions no time to be worried about anything, she just blasted the three beasts with one Air Blast away.  
  
„If all the beasts are so weak like this, we‘re out of Level 2 in no time.“  
The thief sighed in disappointment.  
And she was right. They were on the gate to Level 3, shortly later while defeating all the other beasts and even the Commander of them, Sadi with the same method, effortless.  
  
„Just how strong is she?!“  
Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew asked themselves, seeing her dealing with all of that so easily.  
But they had no problem with the fact, that she was obviously way stronger than them. After all she was a fishman, someone Arlong wanted to be powerful.  
  
They reached Level 3 also called the Starvation Hell and it was really hot and dry there. But since none of them had to live under the near death conditions of Level 3, they were perfectly fine and observed the part desert- part castle like location.  
  
The four watched the prisoners how they tried to stay alive. Hard to believe, that they were once frightening criminals and how wrecked they looked like now.  
The three fishmen watched them suffer in delight, just like humans should be.  
But Kagami‘s expression was different, no one could see it because she walked in front of them. However the look in her deep purple eyes was sympathy, she felt bad for the inmates…  
  
Walking through the Starvation Hell wasn‘t an issue with Kagami dealing with everyone, trying to stop them until they encountered someone right before the hole down to Level 4.  
The warden Hannyabal himself with his sword Kessui was ready to face the phantom thief personally. He was quite indignant about her company:  
„Kagami why are you helping these guys to escape?! These are brutal criminals, people not like you!“  
  
Kagami did lots of research about Impel Down before sending the advance notice and found out about Magellan, who was still in charge for the torture and of course the chef warden Hannyabal, who was a respectable person for his ideals.  
  
Kagami placed her right palm on her chest and reached out with her left to give some kind of stop sign:  
„They were Sun Pirates and I‘m an ally of all freedom fighters. I know, what they have done for the last 10 years and I‘m going to discuss it with them later but that‘s not the matter right now. I came here to steal your Platinum Emblem like I announced it prior and for this I want to ask you to let me through Mr. Hannyabal. I have no intention in fighting you or harming anyone!“  
  
Arlong, not understanding her weird behavior, interrupted the conversation:  
„Whats with that negotiation Kagami?! Just kill him and we‘re getting through anyway!“  
„Quiet Arlong!“ She shouted at him giving a stern look.  
„This is my heist and that means we‘re doing this my way! And that means if I can avoid a fight with negotiation I‘ll do it!“  
This silenced the shark. He and the others were clearly intimidated by her sudden seriousness.  
  
„This is exactly how I expected you to be Kagami.“  
The pharaoh looking warden said. „Seems that what everyone said is true. You never kill or use unnecessary violence.“  
„That‘s correct.“ The stingray woman agreed. „My phantom thief codex forbids it. A true master thief doesn‘t win with blunt violence, they use their head to achieve their goals. You‘re an intelligent man who only fights in extreme situations. I know you only want to protect everyone and I respect this ideal. We can solve this peaceful, so just let us through this hole and we‘re done here."  
  
Hannyabal, who truly respected this woman even thought for a second to go with it but he just couldn‘t let this happen, his duty as chief warden forbids it. But he came up with his own idea instead:  
„I have an other deal. I‘ll let you and the three prisoners escape and we‘ll do as nothing of this happened. I‘ll tell everyone you had to retreat and gave up on the treasure! If I would just let you do as you like, every criminal, who is an actual horrible person will do as well and Impel Down will suffer even more. So please just leave! We both don‘t want to fight!“  
  
Actually touched by Hannyabal‘s own try to find a peaceful solution Kagami closed her eyes and in her right hand appeared a bright green twisting ball of the size of a bowling ball. A strong air gust came from it, was it another one of her wind attacks?  
„So much for the negotiation...“  
She said quietly and then told him: „I can‘t just give up on the treasure! It‘s important for my ideals and what I try to achieve! I can‘t lose to this prison! A phantom thief only leaves, when the treasure is stolen!“  
  
With that it looked like she was going to throw the ball at the warden and he was ready to attack her with his sword in regard.  
As he rushed to her, she suddenly let the ball disappear, much to Hannyabal‘s surprise.  
Then Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew were covered in wind and began to float.  
  
„Wh-what‘s going on here?!“ Kuroobi asked, still flying.  
„Our chance!“ Kagami announced, transforming into her logia form, and blowing in Hannyabal‘s direction.  
  
The three fishmen flew forward as well carried by the wind Kagami hold them in, arriving the hole.  
  
Before the chief warden had the chance to turn around, the phantom thief manifested herself behind him with her palm open:  
„I‘m deeply sorry for this but I guarantee, that you‘ll perfectly fine after that, especially with your stamina. And now Air Blast...“  
After she apologized, she blasted the chief warden Hannyabal far, far away with one gust explosion.  
  
As she took care of him and making sure, he won‘t be able to follow them for a while, the four flew down on a safe platform of Level 4 also known as the Blazing Hell.  
Down there it was even hotter as on Level 3 of course, after all the heat came from there in the first place. But all four of them were quite fine and Arlong asked himself why.  
But then he noticed cold air around him and his brothers. Kagami covered them in cold wind as protection…  
  
„This was a quite clever trick you used to get rid of the chief warden without fighting him, chuu.“ Chew admitted.  
„Thank you.“ Kagami said, turning her head to his side during walking to talk to him properly.  
„I‘ve planned this trick out from the very beginning. And sorry Arlong for yelling at you like that but I had to be legit while negotiating.“  
  
„Oh, it‘s fine. After all it was part of the plan.“ Arlong forgave her. „And I loved how you blasted the boss here away!“  
„Yeah, yeah amazing I know. Even if the things I said weren‘t a lie. My trick was just plan B by the way. I really wanted to find a deal, after all it sometimes works with reasonable people and he was reasonable.“  
  
„Does that mean you really are pacifistic?“ Kuroobi wanted to know.  
„Guess you can say so, but not entirely. I can fight if I'm directly challenged and want to, I'm forced to or when I am really pissed and not just holding back. But since I‘m a mind over muscle person, I clearly prefer trickery. I‘m just glad, that I didn‘t unleash too much power on my last Air Blast. Then you should know, from far away it only blows enemies away and knocks them unconscious but from a close distance it can cause massive damage.“  
Kagami explained it to them.  
  
„But whatever, enough of my ideology now. It‘s non of your business after all. And if you have a problem with me not killing, then sucks to be you.“  
She grinned widely returning to her carefree attitude she had before encountering Hannyabal.  
  
Was she just really moody and impulsive or was she just very adaptable when it comes to her emotions in serious situations?  
Was another question Arlong now had about this woman that was more and more confusing with every word she said and every action she took…  
Why was she just so unpredictable?!  
  
During their way to their final destination they saw how the inmates were tortured by letting them bathe in the gigantic pot of boiling blood.  
Arlong hated the sight of this thing.  
After all he had to bathe in it several times already. It was horribly painful but he stayed still and kept his cool. Never he would show weakness in front humans! He was relieved as he heard, that his brothers hadn‘t had to go through this.  
  
They also saw other kinds of tortures like hanging from ropes over burning flames or some kind of slave-like work. Seeing all of this made Kagami sick and angry.  
„So cruel...“ She mumbled, biting her lip.  
  
The guys asked her to repeat herself since they didn‘t heard it correctly.  
„I said, so cruel.“ The thief repeated. „It‘s so twisted how the humans treat everyone like this, even their own kind. And sometimes or quite often, without particular reasons. Why is humanity like this? It truly disgusts me!“  
  
„Aha, so Kagami holds some negativity towards humans herself...“ Arlong reasoned.  
He placed his hand on her shoulder and tried to explain something to her:  
„Simple my dear Kagami. Because humans are an evil, cowardly species, who just wants the things as twisted and disgusting as they are. No wonder, that the biggest atrocities in world‘s history were all committed by humans.“  
  
And now he started explaining his ideology to her. At least he tried because there was something she had to inform them about:  
„I know that too well Arlong, I studied world history. Humanity is rotten to the core but fishmen are no saints either. Especially proven by recent events.“  
  
„Huh, what are you talking about? What recent events?!“  
Arlong eagerly wanted to know.  
„Let‘s just say, not long ago, some unpleasant incidents occurred on Fishman Island and it was the fault of fishmen,,,“  
  
Kagami explained in a cold voice, again adapting her emotions to the situation.  
This information struck the three like a lightning bolt, especially Arlong. An atrocity? Committed on Fishman Iland?! In this moment he realized he didn’t just want to get out of there, he must to get out of there. He must see and know what happened. His sister lived there, he must confirm if she’s fine!  
  
So he grabbed Kagami’s shoulders, turning her around to properly facing her and yelled:  
“What in the world happened?! You must tell me! How much got destroyed?! How many people got harmed or died?! I have to know!”  
  
Stress and fear and panic were written in his sweat-flooded face. Kagami, who was a bit shocked, decided to calm him down by telling him a bit:  
“Well many got hurt but nobody died…actually no, a few mermaids were killed...”  
  
The fact, that the culprit in that case was a human was hold back by her. But these information didn’t calm him down, it even made it worse.  
He panicked and ran forward.  
But before anything happened Kagami, Kuroobi and Chew ran after him and the stingray hold him by his arms with him yelling at her:  
“Let me go! I must out of here! Now! Shyarly! I must know, if nothing happened to Shyarly!”  
  
Kagami saw that the look in his eyes changed. They were narrowed like the Sea Kings, when they went on a rampage…  
  
“Shyarly? You mean Madame Shyarly the owner of the mermaid cafe?!”  
Kagami asked, still holding Arlong tight.  
  
“Yes!” Chew confirmed. “She is Arlong’s younger half-sister! He is worried, that she could have been one of the victims!”  
  
She was surprised about that reveal but fast-thinking as she was, she told Arlong, that he didn’t have to worry about her because she was totally fine right now, doing her cafe business.  
After confirming, that she did mean that serious Arlong took a few deep breaths with his hand on his chest and cooled down again. He did his best with his hot-blooded personality. Knowing his beloved sister was alive and well was the biggest relief he had in a long time.  
  
“So back to the actual plan!” Kagami brought back the focus.  
“The warden’s office and my target are right over there, follow me guys and be very, very careful.”  
  
She pointed at a door around 15 meters away, with that they headed to it.  
During that, Kagami especially focused on her observation haki, after all the actual threat could be waiting for her, the vice warden and user of the poisonous devil fruit, the Doku-Doku no Mi, Magellan.  
  
Standing right in front of the door, not having sensed Magellan, she opened it.  
The office was really big and on the wall hung the symbol of Impel Down, the Platinum Emblem.  
  
“So there is it. Will you go in and take it, chuu?” Chew asked bluntly.  
“Of, course not!” Kagami responded to the in her eyes foolish question. “Look closely how a top notch phantom thief steals treasure!”  
  
The phantom thief took the same pose as she would use Air Blast, reaching out with her open palm. But instead the emblem suddenly moved on its own and flew directly into Kagami’s hand for her to snatch it. She used wind to let it float to her.  
  
“Yeah!” She cheered victorious. “Phantom Thief Kagami has stolen the treasure, ngahahaha!”  
This was her simple pattern: Infiltration, stealing and escape and the time for the final step has come.  
The guys congratulated her slightly, after all she went through multiple potential death scenarios and managed them at ease without a single scratch, it was almost too easy, even for her…  
  
“Well then guys, the time has come. Let’s get out of here. For this I’ll use the quick travel route.”  
“Uhhh, and what is the quick travel route?” Chew asked quite worried.  
No, answer. She just shaped the same ball out of air she briefly used to trick Hannyabal and trow it up in into the ceiling with her shouting out:  
  
“Air Bullet!”  
  
The canon ball made out of air, that was thrown, went up more and more, crushing big holes into all ceilings of each Impel Down floor, even opening the roof.  
  
“And this is our escape route. We’re gonna escape while flying up to the roof and escaping without even encountering vice warden Magellan.”  
Kagami explained her plan to them and they started to fly up.  
  
Her brilliant idea gave them hope of an actual successful escape, but it only hold up until they made it to Level 3. Then suddenly, before they passed through the hole to Level 2 Kagami sensed danger, stopped and let them land on the floor, save.  
  
The reason why she did this was simple:  
If she had hesitated even one second, they all would have drowned in the amount of liquid poison that was fired right in front of the hole.  
  
Around 15 meters away from them stood one who was responsible for this, the huge, devil-like looking vice warden Magellan.  
  
“You have good reflexes. If you would have been a bit slower, this could have ended really bad for you. But not that this matters anyway because you are going to fall Phantom Thief Kagami!”  
Magellan announced his entrance in the scene. He already got his 10 hours in the bathroom over with to be compleatly ready for this moment...  
  
Kagami made the theory, that Magellan may have left Level 4 in the moment they entranced it, to ambush them on Level 3 when they were up to escape.  
  
Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew tried to not show their fear, even if no one would blame them for doing so. After all Magellan was incredibly powerful, feared by everyone in the prison and even from very strong people like the former Warlord of the sea, the whale shark fishman Jinbe and the deceased Portgas D. Ace.  
But Kagami was different, despite of being fully aware of Magellan’s skilsl and powers, she hold a poker face in form of a smug and overconfident grin, showing little to no sign of fear at all.  
The only thing she did was, giving Arlong the treasure to take care of.  
  
Magellan was clearly displeased by her current attitude and wanted to teach her respect. For this he covered himself in his poison and set a Chloro Ball free, that headed towards the escapees.  
In reaction Kagami formed a big blade out of air, what she had called “Air Slasher” and cutted the ball in half, which in respond really pleased Magellan.  
  
Because of her doing that, she released poisonous gas inside it, ready to paralyze them all.  
However as the gas disappeared, Magellan couldn’t believe, what he just saw…  
  
They were perfectly fine! All four of them!  
  
The vice warden asked why and Kagami answered this with a calm grin:  
“Oh, just for you to know, my wind has a quite cleaning effect, ngahaha.”  
  
This was when Kuroobi realized a small but very important detail.  
The wind they were covered in since they have entered level 4 wasn’t there to cool their bodies down in the first place! It’s main purpose was to protect them from Magellan’s poisonous gas in case they had to encounter him.  
A very small but clever set up from the get go.  
  
Now Magellan was even more infuriated by her easily preparing a counter strategy against him. But this wasn’t the end yet since Kagami wasn’t even done yet boasting with her superior intellect.  
“Ngaha, do you really think I would have come here in the first place and facing you while being so calm without having a few tricks in my sleeve?”  
  
“Kagami, did you forget, that you don’t wear any sleeves?” Arlong interrupted her speech.  
“Shut up and don’t ruin my cool style!” She yelled at him, blushing in embarrassment.  
  
After this little sketchy conversation, Magellan didn’t hesitate to throw a wave of liquid poison on them. The three fishmen already ready to dodge were hold back by Kagami.  
  
“Stay still and close to me! I’ve everything under control, like always!”  
  
“Air Blast!”  
  
With the exploding sound of the gust, the wave of poison was blown away from them and back to Magellan, who wasn’t affected by this at all thanks to his Devil Fruit.  
  
“Just as I thought!” Magellan spatted angry at her. “It’s the Arashi-Arashi no Mi! The powerful logia Devil Fruit with the power to control air and wind itself! But why do you have it?! It’s power should be currently in the possession of...have you anything done to him?!”  
  
“No, no he’s perfectly fine despite his old age. But how I gained this power anyway is something I won’t tell you Mr. Vice Warden. It’s my precious little secret.”  
Kagami explained to him with a lovely smile.  
  
Arlong and his brothers didn’t understand the conversation, it gave them even more questions.  
Who’s him? The power of the Arashi-Arashi no Mi should have been in his possession right now and Kagami and Magellan knew him? Does that mean Kagami despite obviously using Devil Fruit powers, she haven’t eaten one in the first place?!  
Who and what was she?!  
  
“Grr, whatever!” Magellan yelled in rage. “I’ll not let a petty little thief escape from this prison with the treasure and three inmates! I’ll capture you and torture you til the end of your days for your insolence and disrespect towards Impel Down! I may be only vice warden now but I’ll do everything to secure Impel Down’s reputation! There’ll be no second break out!”  
  
“Okay, try your best Mr. Vice Warden. I bet you’ll fail anyway. Nobody was able to ever corner me and you won’t be the first to ever archive that.”  
The thief responded with smugness all over her face.  
  
“My, gosh, I really hope everything goes according to her plan and she exactly knows what she’s doing, because this guy now really looks pissed at her provocation!”  
Kuroobi had in his mind, overwhelmed by this critical situation and is still asking himself how the hell she could hold her poker face.  
  
“Hydra!”  
  
It was his infamous signature attack, the three headed dragon made out of poison. The attack, feared by all of Impel Down was going to attack the phantom thief with all the force it had.  
If this would hit her, the poison would have caused massive damage to her nervous system and not just her, Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew would have been in it’s range as well. But still, Kagami didn’t show the slightest intention to move an inch.  
  
Instead she clenched her fist tighter as usual. Concentrating more energy in it, then before and releasing an Air Blast that strong, that many parts of Level 3 was blown away and the Hydra was thrown back a few meters mush to Magellan’s surprise.  
He realized that wind, like fire was a good counter againsthis poison attacks.  
  
But Kagami wasn’t done yet she just started. She formed a huge amount of little blades of air and fired it on the Hydra. She called this attack:  
  
“Air Cutter!”  
  
The Hydra was cut into many big drops of poison by it and the drops flying in Kagami’s direction were just blown away by her like earlier.  
Magellan couldn’t believe, what was happening. So many of his attacks were complete useless against her, she just blocked them.  
In the thought of actually being cornered, the vice warden even considered to use his ultimate technique, Venom Demon: Jigoku no Shinpan.  
  
Kagami had this already in her prediction of him, since all the other attacks failed. But she won’t let him. Especially not because she didn’t want to destroy the entire prison herself with lots of victims in an attempt to defend herself.  
So she decided to talk.  
  
“Mr. Vice Warden, do you want to know, why I’m so confident right now even though I have a very powerful opponent right in front of me?”  
“Sure!” The vice warden answered curious but still enraged. “Why are you so cocky?!”  
  
“Because it’s the way of how phantom thieves, just as myself do things.”  
She explained while crossing her arms in pride.  
  
“I go on things with perfect calculation and prediction of events. I’m planning everything through in every situation, and know exactly what I’m doing. That makes me always twelve steps ahead of my opponent.”  
  
“What do you mean with that?!”  
“Ngaha, simple.” She turned her hands around and opened her palms.  
  
“I’ve won, the second I decided to rob this place!”  
  
Suddenly a small but strong tornado appeared, created by Kagami. The four fishmen were outside of its range but Magellan was right in it. Still standing in place but he had problems to move.  
  
“Ngahaha, you fell right into my trick!”  
The phantom thief called out, forming an Air Bullet.  
  
However, she wasn’t just ready to throw it, she launched it with a powerful Air Blast to give it even more devastating momentum.  
  
The powerful attack flew towards Magellan and he realized, if he wasn’t defending himself from it, he would suffer massive damage. So he decided to use his Doku Fogu. He took a deep breath, slightly inflating his body and facing the attack.  
The force that came from it was enormous and it hurt but he was able to endure it. But then he realized a critical problem in the moment of the impact. The tornado he was inside not just only limited his movement, it also caused the attack to keep going to cause him to hold the defense.  
  
He couldn’t move, he was stuck, fallen into a trap set up by Phantom Thief Kagami.  
  
Now, that Magellan wasn’t a threat anymore they continued their plan in flying up to the roof.  
  
Since her confrontation with Magellan up to the point, they were on the way up Arlong was stunned with all what happened.  
Not only did Kagami compleatly outsmarted the mighty vice warden, one of the most powerful forces of the world government and made him unable to move, no.  
She planned all of this out from the very beginning!  
  
Again, if she wasn’t on his side, Arlong would have been truly scared of her. Kuroobi and Chew thought the same way…  
  
Soon they made it outside, to the roof in the deep but bright night. It wasn’t much to the freedom.  
Everything could have been so perfect, if not all of Impel Down’s employment weren’t outside aiming with guns and canons on them.  
  
“Shit!” Kuroobi cursed. “We were so close! Kagami could escape by herself by turning into wind but we would definitely be hit! We would need a miracle to get safely through this!”  
  
“Ngahaha…” Kagami cackled in response.  
  
“What’s so funny?! Do you have a plan?!” Arlong asked and clearly hoping she did.  
  
She continued her cackling and it got even louder until she started shouting out with widening out her cape:  
“Ladies and Gentlemen from Impel Down! I’m glad to announce you, that I’ve gracefully stolen the Platinum Emblem! And this manta ray gentleman asked me, to escape by a miracle! I would be pleased to give him his miracle!”  
  
She ended her announcement by forming an X with her arms and the guys asked her, what she was doing.  
  
She turned her head to them, giving a kind and determined smile:  
“As long as the bright moon is shining down on me, I, the pleaser of crowds, will always perform a miraculous show.”  
  
She opened her X-formed arms and to the surprise of everyone, she created a tornado-like route from the point they were standing, all the way to the sea, where nobody would be able to get them, when they were once there.  
  
“Here I gave you a safe escape route called Tornado Tunnel and your miracle. We just have to jump through it. Do you trust me enough to follow me?”  
  
“What weird answer is that?!” Arlong asked in return.  
“Of course we trust you! After everything you’ve done for us, how could we not trust you?! Plus we really want to get out of here! Right brothers?!”  
Kuroobi and Chew agreed with no doubts.  
  
Kagami smiled gently at them and they began to jump through. First Kagami, then Arlong, then Kuroobi and finally Chew.  
  
Their trip through the Tornado Tunnel went quite fast despite being thrilling. But before they arrived the end of it, Arlong looked to Kagami and saw her grabbing her mask with both of her hands and actually ripping it off.  
  
When this happened, they all heard a loud splashing sound from landing into the sea.  
They were finally free.  
  
The guys, overwhelmed by joy and relief, they gave each other a high five. As Arlong and his brothers turned to Kagami to say thank you, they something really obscure.  
  
In the moment Kagami ripped her mask off, she was covered in a green flame-like light and now it was gone revealing her again but there was something very, different.  
  
Instead of her pompous tuxedo and cape there were now a pale dark blue sleeveless hoodie jacket over a white tank-top and revealing her gills. Instead of these ultramarine jeans were now camouflage green loose pants and an emerald green sash. And instead of her high black boots were ordinary brown tramping boots. Her hair stayed the same ash gray mess but now her face was revealed.  
  
The dark blue marks overher dark purple eyes were more visible now but her expression was completely different now, while looking at her mask in her hands.  
  
Gloomy and very irritated, nothing like the cheerful and cocky phantom thief from a few seconds ago.  
  
“Kagami?” Arlong called her in a gentle tone, almost worried about her with that gloomy look.  
  
She turned around and gave him an answer he didn’t see coming:  
“Mysterious Kagami, the miraculous phantom thief. That was the name of the woman you encountered and helped you out. This right now is me. I’m Maika...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally I've finished the prison break and could show some of Kagami's powers.  
> This is the first time I've developed a protagonistic OC, that is actually very powerful.
> 
> The chapter name is btw the opening theme song of Persona 5


	3. Beneath the Mask

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Free but now confronted with even more confusion and weird twists of events.  
> And Kagami reveals her other side to them.

Finally in freedom they all thought everything would be alright now. But instead they were confronted with a new mystery:  
The person, who helped them to escape, completely changed. Not only the appearance but also her entire mimic and gesture and she was calling herself Maika now.

“What the hell are you talking about?!” Arlong asked loud, not understanding anything of this at all.  
“Like I said, the woman, who saved you was Kagami and I’m Maika. We are the same but also different people. “ The woman named Maika tried to explain but it was really confusing. “Tsk!” Arlong spatted. “Seems like you still enjoying talking in riddles, I want answers dammit!”  
“Sorry but I can’t explain it to you! At least not now!” Maika responded annoyed.

After Arlong realized, that he made her angry, he shortly apologized, still not understanding, what was going on.  
“Wasn’t Kagami really upbeat and cheerful?" She accepted his apology and swam a bit forward.

“Anyway we shouldn’t stay here. Follow me, I can explain you a bit when we take a break. But for now we should just get away from here.” She suggested bluntly. But before they followed her she turned around with a tired glance:  
“Oh, and Arlong..”  
“Yes?”  
“Give me my treasure.” Absolutely blunt and emotionless  
“What the hell is up with that woman?!” He asked himself before giving her the treasure.

They traveled underwater for a few hours now but they could cover a large distance since they were really fast as fishmen.  
They decided to take a break on a neat coral reef. Each one of them sat on a stone. Arlong began the conversation, folding his arms.  
“So Kagami or Maika or whatever. You said, that you are going to give us some answers so here we are. Go on.”  
“Fine…” She started in a tired voice, playing with the Platinum Emblem in her hands.

“The me you are seeing right now is the real me, Maika. The other me is an Alter Ego I created to be active as a phantom thief, that’s Kagami. When I put my mask on I automatically transform into Kagami being covered in these green flames for a few moments. So nobody can find out who I am when I’m escaping in the ocean and not the sky like I usually do. You only found out my secret identity out of convenience!”  
“But do you really have to take off your mask, when you enter the ocean?” Kuroobi asked serious.  
“Has this something to do with the fact that you’re a devil fruit user but also not?”

Maika frowned before she answered: “You’re quite clever. Congratulations! You solved one of my little riddles. Yes, it’s true. Only Kagami is able to use the Arashi-Arashi no Mi, not Maika. But in exchange Kagami has the devil fruit curse and I haven’t. That means, when I’m taking my mask off, I’m a regular fishmen like you guys. As Maika I use Fishman Karate as matter of self-defense.”

That was the riddles solution, she’s able to switch in being a devil fruit user and being none. Even if this was a big reveal for them, they were still many unanswered questions they still need to understand about this mystery of a fishwoman.

“And how does this thing with your mask even work Maika-san, chuu?”  
“And more importantly!” Arlong continued. “Why did your entire personality change, when you transform into Maika!?”

She looked away from them with slightly annoyed expression before giving response:  
“I only planned to give you fundamental explanations to this. I still have some personal secrets. Maybe I’ll be able to tell you more someday but not now. After all I only know you for a few hours! Don’t expect me to tell you the story of my life.”

This was almost hissing. Kagami would have gave a similar answer, but in a comedic, more lighthearted way. The way Maika rejected this was just plain rude.

Anyway she was right. She never truly had to give them proper answers to everything and it’s not like she would owe them anything. If someone would owe someone something, then it would be Arlong to Maika, she helped him and his friends after all. So he decided to let her be.

After this conversation passed, Maika stood up, ready to continue their way.  
“Alright guys, we should continue to swim. It’ll take us a few more hours to reach our destination.”  
“What actually is our destination?” Arlong asked, with this question in his mind for a while now.  
“A little island near Fishman Island, my home.”

The hours passed, it was already in the morning for a while but after all this long swimming in full speed, they surfaced out of the water and saw the promised island not far away. The island was surrounded by a little forest of large trees, Maika told them, that her house was hidden inside it.

In a short period of time they went on land, through the forest and arrived at Maika’s house.  
“Uhhmmm, Maika-san?” Chew began.  
“Yes, what’s the matter?”  
“This is no house! This is a little mansion at least! Chuu!”

He wasn’t exaggerating, Maika’s house was very big and fancy, hard to believe that only one person lived there. It was adapted to the environment, so it was greed colored and a lots of plants were growing around it.  
“Oh, did I forget to mention, that I’m rich?” The stingray asked as if it was nothing. Then she reached with her hand into her tank top and pulled her house key out of it. The three fishmen decided to not comment this but at least they knew now, that she would never lose her keys…

She opened the large door and they were able to saw the little mansion from the inside. It had two floors and many rooms, since the building was more wide than high. It had 12 rooms in total with the house being split up in two sides. The left side had three rooms on the first floor and three on the second. The same with the right side. Stairs connected these floors and met up in the middle of the second floor, leading to a huge gate like entrance to a room. In between of the two stairs were also another row of stairs leading downwards, the cellar.

“As what are you working to be able to buy and posses all of this?” Kuroobi asked dry after being speechless for a short while of having this view.  
“First heritage.” She responded, raising her Index finger. “I’m from a very wealthy family. Second, I have multiple so called home office jobs. I do lots of complicated paperwork but since it’s actually really easy for me, they are done in no time and the payment is rewarding in all of these jobs.”  
“I’m going to store the treasure. Stay here, it won’t take long.” Maika told them and walked down to the cellar.

In that time they inspected the entrance lobby, which seemed to function as a large living room. On the left side, there were a big, very comfortable looking couch, an armchair and a large, fancy wooden table in front of them. On the right side was a big old cupboard full of books, a big wooden table with six chairs and many plants, who look like they were easy to take care of. The lobby was also decorated with a large and fluffy carpet and several kinds of valuable antiques. Maybe some of them were treasures she once stole?

Just as she promised, she returned soon mumbling to herself: “I’ll find a good place for it later...”  
“Oh, neat to have you back.” Arlong greeted her as she returned to them. “So, I’ve got a question. Why did you bring us into your private little palace in the first place?”  
“Oh, that’s simple. I just thought you guys need a place to stay and are tired after, hmm I don’t know? Breaking out of the most secure prison in the world?!” This last part was painfully sarcastic. 

“But just if you want to stay here overnight. It’s okay, when you don’t and are uncomfortable with a single young woman living alone in a small mansion.” 

“Maika-chan...” Arlong began with stretching the "chan". “There is nothing to feel uncomfortable with because I already found you weird, the moment I first met you as Kagami and you get even weirder with every conversation we have with you. But there is nothing wrong with being quirky. And I have some kind of affiliation towards special and quirky people. Of course we would like to stay here at your nice little palace.”

His brothers agreed to Arlong’s entire statement especially because all four were really tired. It was a long night, many exciting stuff happened and after that, they traveled for many hours, of course everyone of them just wanted to sleep.

“Okay now with that done we have to solve another thing. Where are you going to sleep? Because I’ve no guest room for three.” Maika asked them but didn’t gave them time to think about it and already gave her own idea:  
“Two of you can share the couch and one of you can sleep on my armchair. But only if one of you can sleep well that way. At least I try to give you some hospitality.” Maika suggested rubbing the back of her head in modesty.

“Oh, that’s no problem for me. I can sleep very well when I’m sitting.” Arlong volunteered.  
“Oh, we all know that Arlong-san, chuu.” Chew commented. “You always took naps in your throne, slash, beach chair back at Arlong Park, where everyone could see how you were drooling, even Nami.”  
“I’m not drooling in my sleep!” Arlong embarrassed trying to deny it.  
“Oh, yes you do precious brother.” Kuroobi confirmed, joining the teasing. “And you snore as well.”  
“Stop you two! Don’t say such embarrassing things in front of Maika-chan!” His cheeks took on a slightly shade of purple while blushing in embarrassment through his light-blue skin. And they just had to laugh.

The biggest surprise however was, that Maika joined them laughing, showing a bit more emotions in front of them for the first time as Maika.  
“Ngahahaha!” She had the exact same laugh as Kagami but more smooth.  
“What beautiful ridiculousness! I can totally understand, that Kagami took interest in you so much besides being former Sun Pirates! You are truly entertaining! Ngahaha!” She continued laughing while holding her belly.

The three fishmen however besides being happy, seeing her being capable of positive emotions, she reflected some of her opinions on Kagami. Like they were totally different people despite already admitting being the same.  
She calmed down and got back to the original topic:

“Anyway, I’m going to bed now and you should get your sleep as well. See you this afternoon or evening”  
“Yeah, see ya.” They said in return.  
After she went upstairs and stood in front of the right door on the left side of the upper floor, she turned towards them one last time:  
“And you are not going to touch anything here. When I’m getting up and you’re gone and just one of my things is missing. I swear, I’ll hunt you down.” The way she said that and the smirk she had while saying this made it impossible for them to decide if this was just a joke or a terrifying threat. But they didn’t had to worry because they never considered to rob her in the first place.

With Maika in her room and Kuroobi and Chew immediately falling asleep on the couch in opposite directions, Arlong sat on the very comfortable armchair, collecting his thoughts.  
“Who could’ve thought, that I would ever see the sunlight ever again? And especially being saved by a famous so called phantom thief, who in reality is a rude, socially awkward woman from a wealthy family? Anyway as confusing and weird the whole scenario is, I’m glad that it ended like that. Talk about miracles, huh?” He let out a satisfied huff and closed his eyes.

“There are way too many things I don’t understand about Kagami, slash, Maika, why she has these powers and how they work being just one thing. But also the little hint about her origins she gave us. Heritage of a wealthy family? There are very few fishmen families with lots of cash… But I remember one, that closed their business 15 years ago because of the owners passing. Man the time-frame of 15-12 years ago was truly a time full of tragedies.”  
Before his mind drifted to Fisher Tiger and he would start to tear up in pain and sadness, he tried to get back to the rich family thought. Weren’t there a super rich stingray-family of jewelers, who had a daughter...”  
But before he could finish his reasoning he fell asleep without noticing.

It was already sunset, when Maika woke up and got out of her room to get something to eat. She went into her big kitchen to get a coffee and a piece of strawberry shortcake. With that she sat down on a chair on her big table in the entrance lobby. 

While eating, she could saw the guys, still asleep. Kuroobi and Chew were quiet and peaceful, but Arlong snored. And it was loud and annoying. So she decided to go to him and do something against it. Standing in front of him let her also see, that some drool was running down his chin. Because she found it gross, she wanted to do something against it first.

For this Maika came out of the kitchen once more but this time but with a piece of kitchen roll in her hands. She then wiped the drool from his chin but when she finished he woke up and opened his eyes.

The saw shark and the stingray stared at each other in a more than awkward silence, not saying anything to each other. Until Maika stepped back around a meter and Arlong shouted in shock with a flustered face:  
“What the hell were you up to with that kitchen paper in your hand and so close to me?! At least ask me for consent first, my god!”

Maika realized quickly, that Arlong interpreted the whole situation completely wrong and as if that wasn’t enough, his yelling also woke up the other two, who looked at the saw shark and the stingray, assuming the same wrong thing. It got even more awkward. Maika, who hardly tried not to freak out explained with tomato red cheeks:

“I just wanted to wipe away the drool, that ran down your chin! Nothing more, I swear! Your buddies were right! You drool and snore in you sleep Arlong!”  
“Well thanks for nothing!” He spatted back in pure embarrassment. Ashamed that she saw him doing that and for assuming the wrong thing.  
Without any words she threw the used kitchen paper into a trashcan and came to the conclusion to change the topic as fast as possible:

“Oh, there comes in my mind...you guys must be very hungry, aren’t you?”  
“Of course that is the case!” The manta ray confirmed.  
“The food in Impel Down tastes horrible and we didn’t get many of it, too.” Chew added.  
“If you have something, please out with it! I’m starving!” Arlong begged, almost desperate.  
Maika thought for a second and came up with a solution:  
“Do you like strawberry shortcake?”  
“Who doesn’t!?”

Maika decided to share it with them and so they all four sat on the table with a cup of coffee (tea for Chew) and pieces of the big and delicious cake. She decided to let it on her single piece, since she wasn’t that hungry and they were on the edge of starvation, especially Arlong, who as a shark had a bigger appetite than other fishmen. She just watched them with folded arms how they were enjoying their meal.

“This tastes amazing Maika-san. And I’m sorry that we’re eating your cake away, chuu.” Chew apologized politely.  
“I know. I always eat something delicious, when I stole something successfully, as a reward.” With her having the cake already before the actual heist, showed how sure she was about succeeding in stealing the Platinum Emblem as Kagami.  
“Where did you learn to make such delicious cakes?” Kuroobi asked before finishing his piece.  
“Hmm, no idea. Maybe you can ask the baker, where I bought it from?” She gave as response, again in total sarcasm.  
“Very funny Ms. Stingray.” Kuroobi gave back but he smiled, finding it funny himself.

“There is one thing I have to bother you.” Maika told them after she took the last sip of her coffee.  
They told her she can go on.  
“So, do you have plans for your future? I mean you don’t have a place to go, do you?”  
After she asked this they had to think about it for a few moments, since they really had no place to go. They were free now but they had no idea what to do with their lives now. So they told her exactly that and she came up with a surprising offer.

“Well in that case...Do you want to move in here?”  
Arlong almost choked on his coffee when he heard this and all three gave her a flabbergasted gaze.  
“Uhhh, guys? Staring at someone is very rude, and awkward...” Maika was very uncomfortable with the situation.

“Oh, sorry.” Arlong apologized. “But what?! We can just stay here in your little palace?! Are you serious!?”  
“Sure, I am really serious with this. I mean there is more than enough space for four people here and it would be way less boring here with such interesting guys like you around me, ngaha.” She explained smiling slightly. “But only if you want this of course.”

Arlong was so full of joy that he stood up, expressing his feelings in full: “There is no need of a second thought here! Of course we would love to move in here, right brothers?!”  
Just as Maika and Arlong expected, they agreed to this without hesitation.

“There you heard it Maika-chan! Thank you for offering this to us!” He told her with a wide sharp-teethed grin, full of gratefulness. But it vanished soon and his face turned into a more questioning one:  
“But why exactly are you doing this for us? Not only this but everything you’ve already done for us. We owe you so much, we could never pay it back...” He was really eager for an answer.

“Oh, I don’t know maybe because you were Sun Pirates and have my respect because of this or I just wanted to have some company and you were the perfect opportunity or I’m just a way too nice person, that felt sorry for you or everything combined or nothing of those things? Who knows?” She vaguely explained, looking at the ceiling.

There it was again, Maika’s talking in riddles. It was really exhausting, just like her sudden mood changes from rude, to really sweet. But Arlong didn’t mind this at all, he liked her and not only because she helped him and his brothers so much. Somehow he wanted to learn more of her, to come closer to her, to befriend her. Despite Maika being so exhausting and unpredictable. Maybe it has also something to do with his certain degree of genuine kindness towards fishmen…

“Good now that this is out of the mind, I know how you can pay back at me a bit.” The Stingray suggested. “Since it’s really annoying to take care of this mansion, doing many home office jobs and being a famous phantom thief at the same time, you are going to help me with the first thing. Cleaning, cooking etc. you should agree to this because if not you can leave again.”  
The last part was said with that threatening smile again.

“Nnn-o problem Maika-chan. We would be glad to help you with your housework.” Arlong responded kinda nervous.  
“Yeah, we would be pleased to support you but don’t put Arlong in the kitchen!” Kuroobi warned her grinning widely. “He would set it on fire, kuhahaha!”  
“Eyy, I’m not that bad of a cook!” Arlong objected embarrassed.  
“Oh, yes you are.” Chew disagreed. “The last time you tried to cook something, you almost set the Sun Pirate ship on fire if Jinbe didn’t stop you, chuu.”  
His face was deep purple, so ashamed he had to be reminded of this little mistake he made years ago.

Maika had to laugh when she had to listen to this conversation:  
“Ngahahaha, don’t worry Arlong, I’m a bad cook as well, most of my dishes are bought!”  
After everyone cooled down with their laughter Maika decided to continue with the organizational things:

“Okay, I have a big guest room free, where you can live. I need to buy two more beds, other furniture things and more hygiene products, to adapt this place for four people. But the most important thing after beds, I need to buy for you are clothes. After all you can’t walk around in your prisoner uniforms any longer, especially Arlong, who is shirtless.”  
They nodded in agreement.  
“I have a fashion catalog, I got as a gift two weeks ago. You can look for a few articles and after I took your sizes, I can go down to Fishman Island to look for all these things and let them deliver here tomorrow. I thought everything through, when I went to bed in case you want to move in here”

Arlong went to to the other side of the table where Maika was sitting and stood next to her. He bowed down and patted her head, his large webbed hand running trough her messy ash gray hair.  
“Shahahaha, you are a really clever and thoughtful young lady, it’s almost scary. But anyway, your ideas sound really good and I’m eager to help, where I can, you just have to tell me what.” He gave a friendly wink and smirk.

Maika responded to all of this with a sweet smile in anticipation for the coming days with her new unusual homemates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is more laid back and to learn more about Maika. Also Arlong was quite chill and nice most of the chapter, mostly because he only interacted with fishmen and it has nothing to do with humans.  
> And, this chapter's title is also the name of a Persona 5 song. but not all chapters are going to be named after them


	4. Rumors and Reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maika goes shopping, an idea came up into Arlong's mind and Maika has an interesting reputation on Fishman Island

“Alright boys! I did all the calculations and lists I need to buy all the stuff for our life together.”  
Maika announced on the morning of the next day after breakfast. She took a cyan satchel, ready to go down to Fishman Island to buy and order everything they needed.

They spent the rest of the last day with measuring the guest room, taking the sizes of the three fishmen and looking into fashion and furniture catalogs. Also they were talking about, if anyone needs some specific hygiene products. The most interesting part for Maika was looking with them into the fashion catalog to see, what fashion sense these guys had, after all she has only seen them in prisoner clothes before. And the result in her eyes, was interesting…

Kuroobi was no surprise. He told her how much he was into Fishman Karate and mostly wanted martial arts clothes and hoodies as casual wear. Chew was also quite normal, always wearing stuff, that was in the trends but Arlong…  
Maika’s thoughts on his picks were:  
“All right tank tops, loose pants and sashes are totally fine, I can even relate to that, I wear such stuff as well. Also are simple hats and also some jewelry but cabana shirts, ankles and Bermuda shorts? Well guess I have to buy that stuff, it’s his choice after all.”

After they did all of the organization, they went to sleep again, since they needed enough energy and focus for the next day, that was going to be filled with lots of work.  
Before Maika left, she told them one more time to not touch anything and to enter no other rooms except the bathroom and kitchen until everything was finished. They answered, that they understood and she left them in the lobby.

They were sitting on their usual places, the couch and the armchair, already bored. Arlong was slightly annoyed with only being allowed to only enter these two rooms. He was a curious person, he wanted to know about his new home. For example, he was very interested how Maika’s room would look like. In theory he could just go in and look, she wasn’t there and his brothers wouldn’t talk. However practical, he would feel like a pervert and if he would touch anything in there, she would notice it and he would be a goner, so he decided not to.

A few other thoughts ran through Arlong’s mind and then he suddenly said, out of nowhere:  
“Hey, brothers. I wanna get stronger.”

They turned their heads to him and he continued:  
“That’s no joke or just some moody babbling, I really mean it! After all what happened, I realized many things. We are weak compared to the people outside of the East Blue. It hurts like hell admitting it, but it’s true. The humiliation against these bastards that came to safe Nami was the final blow for my reasoning.”

His brothers remembered it as well and it made them sick being defeated by humans, the species that gave them hell. And after a painful silence, Arlong continued his little speech with a relieved smile: “But then, yesterday I caught new hope and made me think about the greatness of fishmen again. I saw Kagami single-handing the staff of Impel Down, including chief-warden and vice-warden, with so much ease, it’s incredible! And I also remembered Brother Jinbe and let me realize: If we work hard enough on us, eager for improvement we could eventually get as strong as them!”

He stood up with open arms, driven deep into his speech:  
“And if we manage to accomplish that, we would never have to feel the shame of losing against humans ever again! Shahahaha!”

After his typical laugh at the end of his motivation speech he calmed down and reached the final part:  
“And the perfect opportunity to manage this is Maika-chan.”

“Maika- san?” The other two repeated her name, raising their eyebrows. Arlong was more than excited to tell more about his idea:  
“Remember. She was holding back the entire time, just imagine how powerful she is, when she gives her all, even without her devil fruit powers! And now imagine how much improvement we could make, if we would actually train with her!”

Chew nodded at this but still having some doubts:  
“This sounds like a nice idea Arlong-san, chuu. But what use does it have for us? I mean all the others were locked up in different prisons around the world, the Arlong-Pirates were forcefully disbanded.”

“Hm, that makes sense...Being pirates is impossible for us in our current situation” Arlong agreed but he had a follow up in his mind:  
“But we can’t stay in this mansion forever. Someday we should go outside and be able to defend ourselves. I guess with that argument I could also convince her in training with us. But in the end it depends on her decision. If she disagrees, that would be quite unpleasant but we’re not in the position to force her into anything, not that I even want to.”

With that he sank back into the chair, waiting impatient for Maika’s return, her respond to his idea and especially for his new clothes.

The trip from Maika’s island down to Fishman Island took a few hours, if she swims rather fast.  
Soon Maika arrived down there and walked right to the shopping district, the only place she was really interested in. She went through her to-do list in her head and decided to order the furniture first.

For this she headed to the most fancy furniture store on the island and was politely greeted by its owner:  
“Oh, I’m so glad you decided to honer us again after such a long time Lady Maika.” The trout fishman said to her with an overjoyed smile on his face.

“Yeah, greetings to you, too Claude...” She responded, not interested in him at all.  
“Let’s get right into the business.” Maika stated, pulling out a list of her bag with all the stuff she intended to buy from him. “I want all of this, and you're going to deliver all of this to my house. And it’ll arrive in four hours!”  
Maika always had a rude tone in her voice, while speaking. Especially when talking to people, who were showing her false friendliness.

Claude looked at the list and yelled in shock: “All of this?! Delivered in four hours?!”  
But he quickly got it together and he responded with folded hands and his nervous, pseudo-friendly smile: “O...Of course we can do that Lady Maika. Everything to please the customer, especially you, hehehe.”  
“Okay, fine. I’m gonna leave now, have many other things to buy, too. I’m counting on your service Claude.”

She was heading to the exit when Claude asked her one final question:  
“You are buying things for three people? Who is going to move in?”  
As response she just turned her head around with her typical smug but very threatening dark smirk:  
“I thought your job is selling me stuff and not asking questions, Claude.”  
“Y-yes Lady Maika! You sure have the same aura as Lady Aegis once had...”

After what Claude said, her face had an even deeper frown and very upset she hissed at him:  
“Don’t ever compare me to this woman ever again! I am better than she ever was, get it?!”  
That was the last verbal blow to silence the scared trout and Maika left, now on the way to a store with the hygiene products.

When Maika entered it she was greeted by the employees with the same forced exaggerated politeness and her usual title of “Lady Maika”. She was used to all of this for pretty much her entire life. All fishmen and merfolk treating her like some kind of “princess” or “perfect lady” only because of her roots and reputation as a genius.

Their false friendliness and their tries to “get on her good side” annoyed the hell out of her and told everyone indirectly to fuck off. Everyone down there was so annoying and a pain to interact with, that was the first reason why Maika decided to move to an island in the near but still being an official citizen. The second was, to better hide her life as a phantom thief.  
However she was completely used to it and learned to ignore it as good as possible and so she focused on her list of hygiene products, the guys would like to have.

It was no surprise to her, that they wanted all the good stuff for example the best shampoo or skin care products. Something, what the most humans usually don’t believe is, that fishmen are very clean creatures, who value personal hygiene more than even some humans do. So thinking, that fishmen were dirty and carry diseases is another of their stupid, racist stereotypes the humans had towards the people of the sea.

The last planned station on her to-do list was the fashion store, to gather the new clothes for her mates. She headed straight to the male clothing department and knew exactly, where she had to go since, this was the department she also got her own clothes from. Maika despised wearing or doing feminine things. She accepted and saw herself as a woman but it didn’t mean, that she had to act like one. After all no one shall ever tell her what to do. The only situation, she didn’t mind acting feminine is, when being active as Kagami, where she likes to exaggerate everything in the first place.

While looking for the cabana shirts Arlong wanted, she gained some awkward gazes, even more awkward ones, than usual anytime she was in this store. Maybe it was, that she was looking for stuff, that was way too big for her. Every time she went to the male department, she had to buy the smallest size. Maika may be tall but 210cm was small compared to male fishmen. For example she only reached Arlong to his chest with his 263cm and their difference in their body frames, despite Maika being well build is something that didn’t need to be mentioned compared to Arlong.

The people immediately understood, that it was impossible, that these were for her and so the gossiping began...  
“Did Lady Maika finally have a boyfriend after all? Actually kinda questionable with her dressing like a man.”  
“Boyfriend? I think it’s already a spouse. Look at how many she's buying.”  
A pair of mermaids theorized and Maika sighed irritated.  
“I’m already jealous of this guy!” A middle-aged fishman whined. “Lady Maika turned every love confession down she ever got. He’s so lucky ending up with a sexy, rich and smart lady from wealth.”  
And another man, this time a young adult, theorized another thing:  
“Spouse? I think it’s just a lover. Probably reserve clothes after having a good time. Truly a lucky guy, I also would like to...”  
“I always thought of her as a lesbian...”

Maika was used to ridiculous gossip, every time she came down there it was a different topic for them to gossip about her, but at this moment she had enough so she did her usual thing to make people shut up and said:  
“First, I can hear you, peasants! Second non of your little theories is true in the slightest! And third, even if it is true, it’s non of your business anyway, so I highly suggest to keep your mouths shut!”

It was effective, as always. Despite hating this woman to the core, she is thankful, to have the same intimidating aura to silence people, who annoy her.  
Finally she could gather everything on the list and leave the store.

Usually she hates it being treated like a noble or anything like but she really loved talking town to ass kissers or gossipers like them all.  
Maika herself wasn’t arrogant in a pompous way like Kagami was, but she sure had an ego. A large ego. She knew exactly of what things she was able to do and not only as Kagami but also as Maika. She thinks of herself as more intelligent and stronger, than the most people she knew, because she was. But that didn’t exactly mean she was looking down on everyone and sees herself as a superior being, that was worth more.  
Mostly because she also knew her weaknesses like having no social skills.

Maika was insanly prideful and loved being acknowledged for her talents but that also was another reason she hated ass kissers, who constantly praised her for own personal gain. Towards people, who made themselves small and giving her compliments just to gain benefits from Maika like her money, she loved to act all high and talking down to them. Same with gossipers.

The hygiene products and the high amount of clothes were packed in waterproof boxes she carried without problems. At least nobody asked her to carry all of this stuff for her, since it’s well known how physically strong fishwomen are. Would she buy stuff in a human town, disguised as a human, her would have been offered help way to much for her liking.  
Before returning home, Maika decided to eat something at the only person on Fishman Island she liked.

“Hey, Hachi-kun, how’s business doing?” She greeted the owner of the food stand Takoyaki 8.  
“Oh, good morning Lady Maika, seems like you bought a lot today.”  
The octopus fishman greeted her back, waving with one of his six arms, smiling widely.

The reason why Maika liked Hatchan or better known as Hachi was that he liked everyone and is genuine kind. Because he heard how everyone called Maika with a ‘Lady’ title he did it as well just to be polite, so she forgave him. Another reason was, that he wasn’t the smartest but combined with his friendliness and his funny gestures with his six arms, made him a very lovable dork. He also didn’t know that he was the only one she was actually nice to. Noticeable in she adressing him with  
‘-kun’ something she was only willing to do towards guys she liked and in the current time it was only the octopus.

“Yup, I had to restore my stocks, ngahaha.” She told him.  
“Oh, by the way, how’s your injuries doing. Is it okay for you to work with them?” She asked, worried about his condition.  
“Oh, I’m perfectly fine, I’m recovering really well. See I can cook the takoyaki perfectly, nyuu.” Hachi explained to her while showing how well he was doing. Watching him doing his best made her smile and she ordered some takoyaki from him.  
“Comin’ up Lady Maika!”

It was delicious as always. Hachi sure was a talented cook and Maika was happy for him, that the business was so good recently, especially because the events on the island weren’t that long ago. And since he opened his stand down there, they got along very well, having lots of conversations, where Maika learned a lot about him. She respected him for getting rather quickly on her good side without annoying ass kissing actions and so she grew comfortable with him, laying down her rude attitude.

“Oh, Lady Maika, have you seen today’s newspaper?” Hachi asked her.  
“No, I haven’t. I left quite early today. I’ll look into my post box, when I’m returning. Is there something interesting reported?” The stingray asked with false innocence, exactly knowing, what the octopus was most likely talking about.  
Hachi used one of his arms to give her his newspaper, that was laying around. As she read the cover side, her prediction was confirmed as correct.

“Phantom Thief Kagami successfully stole the Platinum Emblem of Impel Down!”

It was a detailed reportage about Kagami’s heist the last day. About her infiltration, her freeing three fishman inmates, to her escape in form of the Tornado Tunnel. But the fact that she has beaten both Hannyabal and Magellan was covered up. A desperate attempt to protect Impel Down’s reputation.

“Ui, Kagami accomplished something really big this time, don’t you think so Hachi-kun?” Maika asked him curious for his answer about her own accomplishment.

“It was amazing, nyuu!” Hachi cheered while still cooking. “Because she only steals from bad humans and openly shows her incredible skills but newer badly hurts or kills someone, she became very popular in no time. Some rumors spread, that she sometimes even helps troubled people, no matter if they are human or fishman. If this goes on, she’ll truly become a new symbol of the fishmen.” 

The octopus fishman openly showed his admiration for the phantom thief and that made the stingray a bit flustered. She is used to hear rumors about Kagami as well, no wonder, her alter ego was a celebrity after all. But the rumors and general talk about Kagami were more positive, than the ones about Maika. And the negative gossip about Kagami usually just came from members or sympathizers of the nobles or world government, what she found amusing.

“I wish we could see Kagami here on Fishman Island someday.” Hachi passionate told her.  
“I hear the kids often say, they want to meet her. Of course, I mean who doesn’t want to meet a famous idol or hero, who punishes bad guys?”

Maika took a bite of takuyaki and responded to this with a determined look on her face:  
“Cannot blame them, seeing her as an idol or a hero. After all Kagami has a strong sense of justice and will soon become not only a symbol of the fishmen but a symbol of revolution!”

As she finished, Maika didn’t hesitate to praise his food like always and paying him but before she left, she asked him something:  
“Hey, Hachi-kun, I’ll do some renovation today and will be done most likely this evening. How about you’re coming to my place when I’m finished and we could eat some of your wonderful takuyaki together with my totally not bought chocolate cake as dessert?”  
The whole island already knew about her affiliation towards sweet things, especially cake.

As reaction to this offer Hachi was quite surprised and almost dropped his cooking tools:  
“You want me to come to you, to your huge mansion?!”  
Before he could have said any thing further in his loud voice, Maika grabbed his long mouth to keep him quiet:  
“Not so loud Hachi-kun!” She whispered to him. “The people will think wrong of it like always when it has something to do with me! I’m already a target of many rumors, I don’t need another one understand?”  
The octopus nodded to signalize her, that he understood and she let him go.  
“So will you come Hachi-kun?”  
“Of course I’ll Lady Maika, nyuu!”  
“Perfect, then see you later.”

As she left, Hachi looked down on the desk and saw, that she left a tip of 300 berry for him.

The way back took a bit longer because she had to take care about the boxes but after a few hours of swimming she returned to her island. She took out the newspaper from her post box, opened the door and returned home.

As soon as she came in she was greeted with open arms.  
“Welcome home Maika-chan!” Arlong greeted her and took some of her boxes.  
“I hope it wasn’t to annoying to carry all those things.”

The other two were just as kind to her and she didn’t notice, that she blushed a bit by their genuine kind treatment of her, since something like this newer happened to her but she appreciated it.

“No, no everything is fine. There weren’t any problems. By the way in the boxes Arlong-kun holds are your new clothes.” Maika informed them. And as she did the guys thanked her for buying literally anything they had choosen and immediately wanted to try them on. For that Maika went into her room waiting for them to be finished.

It took them way too long for her liking: “My gosh, how long does it take for three guys, just to pick something to wear!” She said to herself, slapping her palm into her face in annoyance.  
But to her relief she heard Arlong saying, that they were finished.  
Maika came out of her room to inspect their new looks.

Kuroobi decided to wear a dark brown hoodie over a black martial art costume, he was more simple when it came to a decision.  
Chew decided to wear a sleeveless dark yellow jacked over a dark blue dress shirt, wide dark green pants, that reach to the knees and a pearl necklace.

And then there was Arlong, who wore a dark green, opened up cabana shirt with a lightning pattern in a brighter green. Gray loose pants, that reached only a bit over the knees, a lavender sash and a normal brown hat to get his chaotic long black hair at least a bit under control. Maika also noticed, that he wore golden loop earrings and a chunky golden chain bracelet on each of his wrists as addition to his to the jewel piercings he already had on his left hand. It was a weird combination of stylish and cool but also funny and ridiculous.

“Lookin’ good you three.” Maika told them, giving a thumb up.  
“Thanks Maika-chan, I’m glad you like, what you see. Finally I feel like myself again with my typical awesome look, shahaha.” Arlong praised himself while adjusting his new shirt.

Soon the door bell rang, Maika ordered the three to hide in the kitchen and when she opened the door, she saw that all the furniture was delivered. Maika couldn’t stand Claude but she still bought his products because he had after all a damn good service. She signed the forms and sent the delivery service away with the words, that she can take care of all herself.  
When they were gone, she called the three fishmen out of the kitchen to help her carrying and building all their new stuff under her instructions.

They finished the wardrobe first so, that Maika could put all their, clothes and towels inside she bought, while the others worked on the beds and bureaus.  
Then she placed the hygiene products in their right places in the bathroom. When she left it, Chew saw her heading to the refrigerato, putting a weird looking can inside.

“What was that Maika-san?” Chew asked curious. “That didn’t look like something to eat, chuu.”  
Maika closed the refrigerator’s door and answered: “Because it isn’t, well kinda, you took it oral. It’s an antidote.”

“Why the heck do you need an antidote?” Arlong asked while working.  
“I don’t but maybe you if one of you accidentally stings themselves on my venomous tail.”  
“Wait you’re venomous?!” Chew asked shocked, almost dropping the hammer.  
“Yup, I am.” Maika confirmed dry. “I am a feathertail stingray remember? They’re a these kind of rays, who are indeed venomous. But don’t worry, it’s not deadly, it just numbs your body and gives you fever.”  
Arlong added: “That still sounds troubling, good that you bought it. And it’s an important information because it tells me to never stay directly behind you.”

With that the conversation about venom was closed and Maika decided to help them with their work. 

They finished everything the same evening just as Maika predicted.  
“Finally we’re finished and can properly live here!” Kuroobi cheered and they all gave each other a high-five to celebrate their success.

“You know guys, after our accomplishment we should eat something fine.” The stingray suggested. “How about takoyaki?”  
“Sounds fine!” Arlong approved. “Ah, yes, takoyaki...I wish I could taste Hachi’s one more time. It was perfect...” The saw shark mumbled, missing his old friend.  
“Alright because I already ordered some and it’ll arrive in around an hour. How about I show you the rest of my home.”

The other six big rooms of her mansion contained a small gym with lots of sports equipment, a giant library with too many books, her workroom, where she did all the stuff for her many home office jobs, a storage room for several stuff since the cellar was used to store the stolen treasures, another storage room but for food only so she didn’t constantly have to leave her island to get some food, especially with three other people she now had to feed and finally an empty room she literally had no use for. The four decided to make a hobby room out of it later.

After the little tour through the mansion, Arlong had to tell her: “Unbelievable, that two days ago only one little stingray lived in this pretty dollhouse. Maika-chan it’s good, that you finally got some company here to bring a bit life into this lonely palace. I promise you will not be bored, shahaha!”  
Arlong announced to her, wrapping his arm around her and pressing her slightly against his chest. Her only response to this was: “I’m not lonely!”

Not anymore…

The door bell rang again and the same scene repeated itself with the guys hiding and Maika opening the door. This time it was Hachi, who came for her invitation. He wore a fluffy yellow collar, a pearl necklace, a black tank-top from Crimin and dark blue shorts. In two of his hands he carried boxes with food.

“Good evening Lady Maika. Thank you for your invitation. I made a lot of takoyaki, just as you wished, nyuu.” He greeted her politely.

When Arlong and the others heard the voiced behind the doors, they couldn’t believe it first but after waiting a few moments, they recognized this voice as Hachi’s and so they couldn’t hold back anymore and had to go out.

“Hachi is that you!” Arlong shouted in disbelieve.  
“It’s really you old buddy!” Kuroobi and Chew called him.  
When Hachi saw the faces of the three fishmen in front of him, his eyes became all teary so that he gave Maika the boxes and he ran towards them to give them a big hug with them returning it.

“Uuuaahhh, Arlong-san! Kuroobi! Chew! You are really here! I missed you so much! I’m so sorry that I left you behind, nyuuhuuuuu!”  
“It’s completely fine, our little Hachi!” Kuroobi explained overjoyed. “We weren’t mad at you for a single moment!”  
Maika felt the pure happiness of all of them and she gently smiled at the view, not regretting her decision once.

When they separated each other, Hachi asked them while wiping his tears of joy away: “But why are you here? And why with Lady Maika? Weren’t you imprisoned?”  
“Oh, that’s a crazy story. So it was like this...” Arlong tried to explain but Maika interrupting him, telling her own version instead:

“Phantom Thief Kagami released them during her heist! And after that, she left them. They swam around for a while, then conveniently finding my island and I let them live with me out of sympathy, ngahaha!”

“Oh, I’m so happy, that happened! Kagami-san is such a wonderful person and you really seem to be able to feel empathy for others Lady Maika.” Hachi cheered, buying her story.  
Usually he would have been worried about what could happen if Arlong and the other two would be free again. But the current position of these three and Hachi’s own happiness made him not worry at all. After all, they lived with Maika now, someone who absolutely wouldn’t let happen something like Cocoyashi under her watch.

Maika turned Arlong and herself around and whispered to him: “Are you stupid?! I know you would’ve told him, that I am Kagami, if I wouldn’t have stopped you, am I right?!”  
“Is there anything wrong with telling my dear brother the truth?” Arlong asked in disagreement.  
“I think we should involve him in your little phantom thief secret.”  
“And I say, we shouldn’t!” Maika objected slightly angry. “I like Hachi-kun, too. He’s truly a good person but also not the brightest. I don’t want him to accidentally let my secret slip. And that’s why I don’t want to tell him at first. Maybe I’ll change my mind an other time, understood?”  
When Arlong heard that he agreed to this in light disappointment.

They turned back and Maika suggested to eat together on her large desk in the lobby.  
The takoyaki Hachi made was gone rather quickly, following with the cake. Mostly because he made only for two (despite being extra large portions) and because the thing the three fishmen missed the most right after Hachi himself, was his cooking.

“Yo, Hachi! Now that we are living here you should come more often! Having to live for two years without your precious food was painful!” Kuroobi told him, looking at the empty boxes.  
“Of, course I can do that. I know how much you three love my food.”  
Arlong loved to hear this but there was one of many things, that troubled him and he didn’t hesitate to ask: “So there is one thing, I really need to know Maika-chan. Where do you know Hachi?”

The stingray wasn’t surprised, that he asked this and answered:  
“Hachi has a takoyaki stand on Fishman Island for a while now and I love it. Only high-quality cake can surpass it. So we somehow came into small talk while I was eating and noticed just how likable this guy next to me is.” Pointing to the octopus.

They could confirm this. Hachi sure was likable, he had no problem in making friends at all.  
They also congratulated him for fulfilling his childhood dream of having a takoyaki stand.

Maika continued with something interesting, while playing with her chopsticks:  
“Also one thing I noticed was his Sun Pirate brand mark on his forehead and so we came into talk about this topic. He told me more detailed about what you guys did during that time, very cool and interesting stories how about you sank navy ships, etc. But also how much he missed his old comrades, who are currently imprisoned. Aaaannnndddd...”  
She took a deep breath: “... so I decided to plan a little reunion between you guys.” She finished with a small sharp-toothed smirk: “You’re welcome.”

All four stared at her with a flabbergasted gaze and she recalled something uncomfortable:  
“Guys...what did I say about staring being rude?” After that she was caught of guard by Hachi giving her a big hug and told her in excitement:

“You invited me so I can see my dear nakama again! Thank you! Thank you so much Lady Maika! I’ll never forget this wonderful deed!”  
It made her blush awkwardly in embarrassment but she appreciated his gratefulness while the others were showing theirs.

“Oh, there is something I also noticed.” Arlong pointed out. “Hachi, why are you calling Maika-chan, ‘Lady Maika’?”  
“Because everyone down there does that.” The friendly octopus explained. “You know, Lady Maika is the only daughter and heiress of jewelers. The richest and most successful family the fishmen ever had. So successful, that they could even keep up with the wealth of human nobles and that’s why everyone treated them like they were nobles.”

Kuroobi and Chew had open mouths and empty gazes, when they heard that but Arlong stood up and shouted in surprise, while pointing at Maika:  
“I knew it! It was already coming up in my mind! You are Kazuhito’s and Aegis’ daughter! The rumored prodigy child!”

When Maika heard this she scowled, looked away from him and folded her hands as much as her finger-webbing made it possible:  
“Urgh, yes, you’re right. That’s who I am.” She sighed deeply in annoyance. “As you most likely already noticed, I have a more than extraordinary intelligence. I was born with it and could solve very complicated tasks and learn the most complex things at a very young age. I even taught some things to myself just by jumping to conclusions. My greatest strength by far is calculating and not just just in term of perfect planning. I also mastered the highest forms of mathematics and I’m really fast while doing so.”

She took a short break for the others to handle the new knowledge, they gained of the special ray woman. After these short moments passed she continued, still displeased:  
“But that doesn’t matter anymore despite me being probably the smartest fishman to ever exist. Fact is after my parents passing, I inherited everything and sold the company to just mind my own business, now. And still the people cannot forget about my roots and still treat my like some kind of shady celebrity. So can we please change the topic? I don’t wanna talk about this anymore.”

But Arlong didn’t understand her displeasure at all: “But why? You should be proud of all of that! Being from such a successful and famous family and being a prodigy is such a wonderful honor to be born with! You should...”

“Arlong! Shut the fuck up! I don’t wanna hear one single word about this topic again! When I say, I don’t wanna talk about this, I don’t want to, understand?!” 

Maika yelled at him from the top of her lungs. It wasn’t like two days ago, where she just silenced him in front of Hannyabal. This wasn’t some kind of acting, this was anger, pure anger! And seeing her in that state of rage, made her aura more terrifying than ever. 

Intimidated by this dark aura, Arlong sat down again thinking for a moment. This made him realize something he compleatly forgot, when Maika told them about her origins: She hated the nobles, of course she didn’t want to be compared to them with something similar. Arlong, who grew up in the slumps couldn’t understand at first how someone could ever hate to be born into a rich family. 

The shark cursed himself for not realizing this sooner and calmly apologized to her. Maika accepted it and apologized to him as well for yelling at him so hard.

There was an awkward silence for quite a while but Hachi with his positive attitude decided to tell Maika more Sun Pirate stories together with his nakama and she listened closely, truly fascinated.

They spent the entire evening with this until Hachi unfortunately had to leave. But he promised to visit them again as soon as possible. Exhausted from all the events of this day, they decided to go to bed early with Arlong compleatly forgetting to ask her about the training and Maika again missing the timing of telling them about the Fishman Island incident.

In her bed, covered by her dark blue blanket, Maika was sunk into thoughts. Now, that everything was finished to properly start her new life with those three, she asked herself if she would be able to handle all of this…

Working on multiple jobs, taking care of these guys and her mansion, her business as Kagami…

She may was a genius but even geniuses had limits after all.

But she eliminated these doubts immidetly and said to herself while shaking her head: “No, get yourself together Maika! You always get shit done, no matter the circumstances! You had worse situations as Kagami before you became a logia and you were able to handle them all! I have everything under control. I always have everything under control! Since the day I gained my freedom...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, finally Hachi!  
> Finally this lovable octopus could make his debut, unfortunely without knowing the truth :(
> 
> It was fun writing Maika dealing with these gossipers and the ass kisser Claude. I love it, when she uses her ability to silence people.  
> But I also loved the scene , where she lost her cool, since she is usually very good in supressing everything.
> 
> Anyway, her new life with Arlong and the others can truly begin now, that's going to be fun.


	5. Reminiscence and the Cyber Ship Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flashback chapter yay!  
> Views into Maika's childhood and little Hody Jones and teenage Arlong!

Maika’s library looked even bigger with every time Arlong entered it. The library was the room in the center of the second floor, where the stairs matched up.

“And why do you want me here again? I don’t like reading that much Maika-chan.” Arlong asked, feeling exhausted just by looking at all these masses of books.  
“After the renovations, I decided to clean up the other rooms as well.” Maika explained, placing her hands on her hips.   
“I already asked Kuroobi to take care of the gym and Chew of the kitchen and bathroom. And when they’re finished, they are supposed to assist us here because this is going to take a while.”

“Okay fine but why was I chosen to mainly assist you in cleaning up the room, that makes me feel the most uncomfortable?!”  
“Simple.” Maika continued while poking Arlong in the chest with a slightly irritated face. “Because you are the tallest here and when I climb on your shoulders to reach higher points you can just move from alone and I don’t have to go down to adjust you new.”  
“Oh great...” The sawshark sighed sarcastic. “Now I’m going to be abused as a moving ladder...”  
“I’m not abusing you!” The stingray objected. “You don’t have to you know?! You can deny if it’s too hard for you to manage...”  
“Too hard for me?!” Arlong gasped when he heard that. “I was an officer of the Sun Pirates! Being a ladder for a shady stingray girl is the easiest task ever! Even if I’ll be bored to death and just the look of all these books is exhausting as hell!”  
“Alright thank you Arlong-kun.” Maika gave him a sweet smile but was evil cackling on the inside:  
“Ngahaha, the most overly prideful people are just so easy to manipulate.”

While sitting on Arlong’s wide shoulders, Maika, sorted her books, the shark was incredibly bored and had to yawn for a few times. They were working for 30 minutes to this point and Arlong asked her something that haunted his mind during that time: “Maika-chan, why don’t you turn into Kagami and, I don't know... just fly?!”  
“Because Kagami’s job is stealing and not cleaning a library. Plus for flying, I have to produce a certain amount and strength of wind and this would cause an unnecessary chaos.” She explained while working.

“Oh...seems logic...” Arlong sighed in disappointment and prepared himself for a horrible time of boredom, if he wouldn’t have looked on the name of the book, that was in his field of vision.  
“Photo album-childhood, hm?” He took out the book and took a look inside. “Let’s see what we have here.”

When Maika heard that she yelled at him in panic: “Ey, don’t just touch my stuff!” She slapped his head and both fell down with a loud “Thump”. When they both collected themselves again Maika looked at Arlong while rubbing her head with an apologetic gaze:  
“Oh, I’m sorry, that I freaked out. But don’t touch my stuff without my permission okay.”

Arlong told her annoyed, that he understood and both looked at the dropped photo album and saw, that a few photos fell out. Maika picked them up and Arlong decided to help her as an apology. During that Arlong couldn’t resist his curiosity and had to look at one of them.

“Don’t just look at my stuff, it’s private!” Maika complained when he looked closely at it.  
In the photo Arlong looked at were three people sitting on a luxurious couch, two adults and a child in the middle. The woman on the right was a stingray fishwoman with long silver hair, dark blue eyes. She looked really pretty in her expensive, white woolly jacked, long, tight dark blue skirt and pale pink scarf but she also had, just like Maika, a strong aura of authority. On the left was a bespecteled fishman, also a stingray with short, chaotic black hair, red eyes, and a simple but elegant brown business suit. The child in the middle was a little stingray girl with chaotic ash gray hair, dark purple eyes and dark blue marks over her eyes. She wore a cyan dress and an ultramarine ribbon around her hips with a shell in the center attached to it. The little girl also was the only one not smiling.

“The people in there are you and your parents Kazuhito and Aegis, correct.” Arlong asked rhetorical, while pointing on the picture. Maika responded bluntly: “Of course, isn’t that obvious. That little girl looks exactly like me.”  
“You were a cute little child.”  
That compliment made the stingray blush in embarrassment.  
“But not the happiest I suppose...” Arlong remarked.  
“Yeah, with four years I already had a bad relationship with my parents. But that doesn’t matter, this photo is 26 years old, give it so I can put it back.”

Arlong did so and noticed something about what Maika mentioned:  
“Wait you were four in this photo and you said, that it’s 26 years old that means...” He took a second break before finishing:  
“Oh, you’re already 30?!”  
“Oh, you can do the math?!”  
“Shahaha...someone’s a real comedian here. I didn’t know, Kagami is standing in front of me.”  
“Ngahahaha!”

After finishing teasing each other for a moment, Maika focused on the photos again and mentioned during this:  
“You know, I didn’t look inside this album for years so I didn’t recognize the most of them.”  
Shortly after she said this she looked at another photo and had an unexpected reaction to it.  
“Huh?” She first just stared at it but not long after that she brought out a loud:  
“Eeeehhhh?!”  
This caught Arlong’s attention so he turned to her to look at it, too. And when he did, he repeated the noise Maika made:  
“Eeeehhhh?!”

The cause of their reaction was a photo with four years-old Maika next to a little shark fishboy in around her age with white skin, red eyes, curly black hair with a white cap pressing it down, a silver scarf, green-purple striped shirt and yellow shorts. In the middle was a young sawshark, probably a teenager with icy blue eyes, wild shoulder long ink black hair with a blue bandana on his head with a red zig-zag pattern in the center. He wore golden loop earrings, a nile green tank-top and loose pants, striped in different dark shades of yellow, barely reaching over his knees. On his left shoulder was a little shark mermaid with the same icy blue eyes with her right being hidden under her straight inky black hair and she wore a blue sleeveless hoodie.  
The young sawshark boy was kneeing down to the children and hugged them with his muscular arms, they all looked really happy.

After an awkward silence, took Arlong a deep breath and then asked: “Okay, why in the name of Poseidon are you, me, my sister Shyarly and the little Hody Jones in one and the same photo?!”

Maika also was completely confused. She was sure she just met Arlong three days ago for the first time and not years ago! They stared at the photo for a little more hardly trying to remember what the meaning of this was and soon rang a bell in both of their minds:

“I remember!” Both snapped in sync, pointing at each other.  
“26 years ago...” Arlong started.  
“I sneaked out of my home...” Maika continued.  
“A little fishgirl got lost in the Fishman District...”  
“A young fishman picked me up and wanted to take me back home...”  
“But then the humans appeared with a weird ship and...”

Fishman Island 26 years ago:

A really rich and successful family of stingrays ate to lunch on a big and fancy dinner table and their only daughter and heritage just finished her high-quality curry.

“Mother, Father, I’ve finished. It was very delicious.”  
“That’s delightful to hear Maika. That means we can add this curry in our list of dishes.” Her father Kazuhito, the CEO of their company responded pleased.  
“Am I allowed to return into my room again and do my studies?”  
Her parents approved her request, always positively surprised about her expanded vocabulary in her young age of four.  
The young Maika walked down the halls of their mansion and is always very displeased when the well-paid and well-treated maids greeted her politely and bowed under the small stingray.

“Good afternoon Young Lady Maika.”  
“Good afternoon to you, too. You are doing great.” She greeted them back, waving with her small webbed hand. But her thoughts actually were:  
“You bitches are only nice to me because my parents pay you to do so and I’m only nice to you because my parents force me to be polite!”

When she arrived at the door of her room, she was going to open it, but she froze when she was caught of guard by the calm and beautiful but very demanding voice of her mother Aegis.

“Maika before you’re returning to your studies, I would like to talk with you about something.”  
“Y-yes, sure dear Mother...”

They entered Maika’s room. It was really big and full of books and office supplies. The mother and her daughter sat down on Maika’s cozy bed, that was way too big for a four years old.  
Aegis inspected the work desk of her daughter, where she did all of her studies. Solving math problems, expanding her vocabulary, writing essays, learning about the worlds economy and politics etc. They let their daughter do this for already six months, since the moment they discovered, that their daughter was a genius…

Aegis gave a satisfied but cold smile when she turned to her daughter and said to her:  
“Seems like you managed to almost finish your daily amount of studies already. That’s very good Maika, you keep improving.”  
“Thank you very much Mother.” Maika returned her praise with a nervous smile and was just more than relieved, that her mother was pleased with her current accomplishments.

“I’ll have everything finished before dinner, I promise!”  
“I’m glad to hear that Maika. Stay this focused and everything ‘ll be fine.”

The pretty but cold stingray woman stood up and got to the topic she wanted to talk about with folded hands and a very delighted smile on her grayish brown face:  
“Listen Maika I found some very professional tutors, who are going to teach you even more things. That means we’ll expand your study plan. From now on you ‘ll have 8 hours of different lessons and 6 hours of personal studies every day except Saturday and Sunday. Very good news am I right? Now you can gain even more knowledge for your genius brain and teaching about how to become a perfect lady.”

Maika suppressed a shocked gasp as she heard this. 14 hour of just school! She was a 4 years old child, she already felt a bit drained by the current 10 hours!   
She knew her mother was absolutely obsessed with supporting her talent and intelligence as effective as possible but now she got mad with her ‘masterplan’.

The little girl tried to collect herself and found the courage to tell her mother her opinion about this, as calm and polite as possible to just not infuriate her:

“Dear Mother, I know you just want my best but 14 hours just with work...isn’t this a bit much for a little child like me? Couldn't we go with this plan, when I’m a bit older and stronger please?”

When Aegis heard her daughter’s request, she gave her an empty gaze for a short moment and Maika feared a punishment for saying something, that was against Aegis’ ideas. But instead the stingray woman buried her webbed hand in Maika’s short ash gray hair and very firmly patted her head and had a sinister glare as an indirect warning, that said: “Good choice of words. One single wrong word and you would have regret it deeply!”

But what Aegis actually said was: “You know what, you’re right. We shouldn’t burden this little body of yours, too much. The real work comes when you grow older. After all you are going to inherit our company, when you grow up. And when you do, you’ll use your superior mind to lend us and the rest of the fishman race to the top! You are going to be the best! Better than the nobles! Even better than the Celestial Dragons! Your must use your superiority to become a symbol of hope for the fishmen and for this you have to be perfect in every way possible and overthrow them all!”

Her mother talked herself mad again with her great ambition to use her genius daughter, to become the world’s top. It was also very terrifying for Maika to watch her own mother being such a megalomaniac. And she knows, what she all has to accomplish to please Aegis megalomania because if not, she will wake up something really horrifying…

“Do you understand how important you and this plan are, my precious Maika?” Aegis asked with a smile so dark and sinister, it could intimidate literally everyone…  
Maika nodded in respond, covered in sweat and fear. After that her mothers smile went from intimidating to pleased and she stood up ready to leave.

When she grabbed the doorknob, she turned her head to her child one last time and said to her lovely but dangerous:  
“You’ll just have 13 hours of school with a few more breaks. With that I’m going to leave you alone with your studies. Do always your best my dear Maika. Remember, it’s your purpose. There is no other reason why you would have been born with such an amazing amount of talent if you aren’t supposed to do something amazing with it. I know you won’t disappoint us, you’ll be fine.”  
With that Aegis left with Maika giving her a sweet smile as goodbye.

When Maika couldn’t hear her anymore, she stood up from her bed and began to throw a tantrum:  
“Ngaaaaaa! I’m at my limit! Leave me alone! Leave me alone! Leave me alone! Stupid Mother! I have nothing against studying and working hard but I wanna do it in my own way and drum! You shouldn’t decide everything on your own! I’m smart enough to give my own opinion on this as well! It’s my future after all and not your tool for your megalomania! I’m not fine!”

It took a little while but she managed to calm down.  
“I actually like the idea of being better than these stupid nobles but not in becoming the CEO of our company but as a phantom thief!”

Once she mentioned the word phantom thief, her eyes began to sparkle.  
“A cool and mysterious super thief, who can do whatever she wants, shows these shitty nobles how pathetic they actually are and everyone loves her for that! A hero of justice, who spats on the corrupt system like these awesome thieves from my fantasy novels...exactly this is what I want to be. But these annoying parents of mine... “

Her mood changed again and now she began to throw a second tantrum:  
“They always decide what I have to do or to like! I don’t care about jewelry except I’ll steal it! I don’t wanna be a ‘Perfect Lady’ or some other stupid shit! And what’s with these ridiculous girly dresses I am forced to wear?! Stop deciding every step in my life I have to take!”

That was Maika’s rebellious nature. She hated following orders she didn’t like and if someone forbids her to do something, her desire to do it even more increased as long nobody gets hurt by the consequences. After all Maika wanted to become a phantom thief and they don’t cause unnecessary damage. 

However nothing of it mattered at that moment in her life because of her controlling parents. Her mother was a borderline psychotic controlfreak and her father didn’t care at all, as long as the business works was everything fine for him. Not that he had much involvement in raising her at all…

Maika was fed up and so she decided to rebel for the first time!   
After finishing her studies in less than 10 minutes, she took a yellow satchel, ‘some’ money, a camera DenDen Mushi, something small to eat and drink and decided to sneak out until evening.

The act of sneaking out was no problem at all, she just climbed down her balcony.   
Now out of the mansion she decided, where she should go. Her decision was easy: The place her mother was always shit-talking about, the Fishman District.

Aegis often talked about, what poor souls the people from the Fishman District were. Damned to be born into a life of misery, where crime the only way was to survive. They all lived in poverty and the educational system was really bad, since the entire district was actually just a gigantic orphanage. Full of children, who lost their parents because of the humans, who came down here to commit all kinds of atrocities.

Maika really felt sorry for them and found it pretty unfair, that she was born in wealth. But the way her mother expressed her sympathy for the orphans felt like she was actually looking down them for living in the slums and their lack of education. Like she was saying to Maika: “Do what I tell you to or you’ll end like these poor, nonintellectual criminals, that are destined to have no future.”

Just the fact alone, that her mother could actually say that with her typical prideful but also psychotic smile made her feel sick and infuriated while she was on her way.

It took her a little while but she managed to arrive safely. The district counted as part of Fishman Island but it had no sunlight from the tree Eve so it was quite dark. There were many bedraggled buildings and the streets were dirty. This whole place looked dangerous, unhealthy and depressing. Maika was still shocked, that this place was mostly populated by orphaned children and teenagers.

Under normal circumstances, Maika would have never gone there, especially not alone, but her will to rebel against her mother and her curiosity to explore this place were a strong drive for her to stay for at least an hour.

She striped through the district for a short while and she got slightly skeptical and felt watched…

That turned her very observant ready to take act at the right moment. If she should just stay and talk with the person, run away or stay at first, poison them at the right moment and then run away, it depends on the situation.

From a deep shadow the shady person revealed themselves and Maika was quite relieved when she saw, that it was a little boy in her age, a great white shark fishboy.

“Jahaha, who are yo girlie? I’ve never seen you here before.” The little boy laughed, came closer and inspected the young stingray. She prepared her tail and stayed on alarm.  
“Did you just lose your parents or what drove you here?” The boy asked curious. “This dress and satchel look quite expensive.”

Maika thought for a second and realized, that lying wouldn’t help her. He already noticed, that she wasn’t from here and that she was not quite poor so she was honest:  
“I’m from the city of Fishman Island and I came down here just to look, if it’s really such a horrible place as everyone says.” She straight answered.

“Well you aren’t wrong, this place sucks and we aren’t quite welcome on the actual island because of our bad image.” The boy answered, crossing his arms.  
“You’re quite gutsy, when you came down here just to look, but also very careless.” The boy didn’t even try to hide his bad intentions. “Weaklings with neat properties are an easy target for robberies, like right now!”

He tried to attack her but she just stepped aside so he fell on his nose. When he managed to get up he saw Maika looking at him with a vicious smirk:  
“Ngahaha! Rule number one: Call out your attacks, when you’re doing them, not before. You’re not the smartest are you?”

The white shark boy gave her a shocked look when she said this to him.  
“I mean you are so predictable, literally everyone could have dodged that.”

She infuriated him and he was ready to use his little but sharp teeth on her and when he was up on attacking her, she pointed behind him and yelled in panic: “Uaaahhh, humans!!”  
He immediately turned around and saw nothing but he felt a hard punch from Maika’s fists on his head, leading him crushing on the ground, once again face-forward.

“Argh! You little bitch!” He cussed in anger and frustration. “Now you’re just messing with me!”

“Of course I am you moron.” Maika admitted gleeful. “I love tricking people and messing with them, especially when they are stupid and think they are all mighty and smart, ngahaha!”

“Grrr, you wanna me to tear you apart with my teeth stingray?!”  
He yelled at her standing right in front of her but she just crossed her arms, still smirking.  
“I doubt, you would be able to so with your inferior brain, that fells for the most simple tricks. You wanna me poison you with my tail ‘great’ white shark?”

This little one sided debate didn’t last long because soon both children were picked up on their collars by two big hands. 

The young sawshark boy, who picked them up hold them both next to his head and turned himself to the little shark boy: “Hody, harassing little girls is not cool! Dick move lil’ fella!”   
He lectured him with a deep annoyed voice.

Now he turned to the little stingray girl:  
“And what in the name of Poseidon are you doing here?! You’re obviously from the city, didn’t your parents tell you how dangerous this place is?!”  
“Well they did and, hehe...” Maika hesitated a bit to answer because she was slightly embarrassed.  
“I sneak out for reasons and...just wanted to look...” She told him and hoped for a good outcome.

The young sawshark put both of them down and sighed with his palm covering his eyes.  
“You came just down here, alone, just because you wanna look?! When weirdos get bored...”

He turned his angular shaped head down to her and said to her in a calm tone:  
“Listen, curiosity is nothing bad but it isn’t save here and when you don’t have to live here you should stay at your place! You’re lucky that the only one, who tried to rob you was the little Hody Jones. It could have been worse, the worst case being humans! Come, I’ll bring you home. You can ask me questions about the Fishman District meanwhile when you like.”

Maika was quite surprised that this sawshark was actually worried about her but she was ready to accept the deal.  
“Okay, fine. Thank you Oji-san.”  
“Ey, what?!” He snapped. “You little! I’m only 15! You can call me Arlong!”  
“And I am Maika, pleased to meet you.”

The two turned around, ready to head to the exit but they were stopped by Hody.  
“Wait! I wanna come with you Arlong!” He begged Arlong and Maika noticed with what admiration he was looking at him. Arlong had no problem with it neither did Maika, so they walked as three.  
“But we shouldn’t be, too slow. I should be at home soon or my little sister will start to chew on the furniture out of starvation...”

They didn’t walk long and Maika already began with her questions but she asked things, that weren’t, too obvious:  
“Hody told me, that you guys aren’t very welcome by us upper class people. But you are still going to the actual island, so what are you doing there?”

To answer this question Arlong hadn’t to think long: “Hmm, Getting some sunlight, sightseeing? Well I go there to train my water snipe skills.”

Maika always found, shooting water drops like bullets amazing and wanted to learn it herself. But her parents forbid it since it wasn’t “Lady-Like” and that pissed her off. Through to her fascination she asked for more details and Arlong was more than motivated give them to her:

“I’m really good at it and I’m still improving. I even developed a method to let it bounce against extremely hard walls to gain even more momentum.” Maika and Hody were really impressed by it, that boasting Arlong’s ego, making him laugh in pride.

“We all have many problems here because of the harsh life conditions and that leads to many displeasure and aggression between us, resulting in fights and crimes. That’s the main reason why nobody likes us...”   
He told Maika with his hands in his pockets.   
“But I wanna let you know that most of us are more than thugs. Many of us have pretty nice dreams: my brothers Hachi, Kuroobi and Chew want to open up a takoyaki stand, brother Jinbe wants to become a royal guard and Big Brother Tai dreams to become a great adventurer and to travel the world.”

“What beautiful dreams!” Maika responded warmhearted. “I never thought of you people as good-for-nothing thugs. Some might look down on you but I’m not, I want to understand you people. And some of you can be really nice, like you Arlong-kun, you were super nice to me.”

Arlong was quite touched by her words, to think of a kid from the upper-class thinks like that reminded him, why he loves the fishmen. He just smiled and then heard Maika asking:  
“And what is your dream Arlong-kun? What is your wish for the future?”

He had to think for a few moments to find an accurate answer but after he took a deep breath through his gills he found the right words: “I wish for a bright future for the fishmen race...”

The young children gave him curious looks, signalizing him to go further into detail, so he did:  
“With that I wish for a future where our people can live in peace, without having to fear the humans who want to oppress us. You may be too young and live in a safe enough area to understand this but humans are disgusting and evil creatures. Humans are arrogant and think they are something like gods and love to make everyone suffer, who they think stands under them! Humanity is a species, that is scared, when it encounters something different and uses its ability to reproduce in a high amounts to torment the innocent like us fishmen!”

He gave them a serious look while talking about humans. Hody looked like he understood to a certain degree and Maika faced it with innocent curiosity and listened to him closely:

“They like to come down here in hordes and to kidnap some of us to enslave us...” Arlong looked really upset while, talking about it. “They know, that we’re all orphans, that nobody would miss us so they can just take as many with them as they can and they don’t care who it is they kidnap. And they’re not only here to enslave us, they also do other things with us, I won’t cover more since a little girl shouldn’t hear this but I saw everything with my own eyes! All that perverted cruelty! And I even think the slaves have to live even worse once they are caught!”

Once he noticed he talked himself into an outburst of hate against the evil doings of humanity he tried to calm himself down and to return to his original point:  
“Well that is the reason why my wish is really strong. I wish, that our generation doesn’t have to suffer like many others long ago. My brothers, Shyarly, me and of course you two and all the other kids. We should be allowed to live a peaceful life under the sun, where a Fishman District and discrimination against us don’t exist.”

That was a really big dream for a 15 year’s old young boy Maika thought but she was also really shocked about what Arlong told her about the humans. Her parents told her humans are noting more, than stupid creatures, that are easy to manipulate and pressing money out of them. She never thought, that they were such evil beings but something inside her told her, that not all of them could be ultimately evil. Aegis told her, the people from the Fishmen District were good-for-nothing gangsters but she found someone really nice so why shouldn’t it be the same with humans?

According to her very reliable intuition, Maika thought of Arlong as a very stubborn and hot-blooded person and because she had not the motivation to argue with him, especially because he had some points in at least a few things she just let it slip as it was.

“Yeah, you’re right Arlong! Humans suck!” Hody cheered, agreeing to everything like a little fanboy: “That’s why I wanna become a royal guard just like Jinbe so I can protect the fishmen from stupid humans!” Along gave him a proud, wide grin before he turned to the little stingray.

“Oh, you shouldn’t be forgotten Maika-chan. What is your dream, if you have one?”

She smiled wide and optimistic, when she answered: “My parents want me to lead their family business but I refuse! I want to become a phantom thief instead and punish the evil humans out there like the Celestial Dragons.”

The two sharks gave her confused looks: “What is a phantom thief?”

“Arlong-saaaaannnnn!!!”

All three turned around and saw a young octopus fishman running to them and he was in panic.  
“Hachi-nii, what is wrong?!” Arlong asked his friend worried.  
“Humans are here, nyuu!” The young Hachi announced pointing to a ship in a bubble over the district.

They all looked up and saw it. It looked very unusual, it was completely mechanic, they’ve never seen anything like it before.   
“Arlong-san, we already tried to attack it, but every time we did we were stoke by electricity, we can’t harm it and worse, I even think they have your sister!”

“WHAT?!” Arlong yelled in disbelief and horror in his eyes.

“Yes, when we saw that human ship, Kuroobi immediately ran to your apartment to make sure she is safe but she was already gone and everything was messed up, nyuu!”

“Damn! Why do have Big Brother Tai and Jinbe be not here today!” He cussed in rage and was ready to head to the ship.   
“I don’t care about the electricity, I must safe Shyarly and punish those dirty humans for what they’re doing!”  
“But Arlong-san...”  
“No, buts! Eighter you help me or not!” 

The sawshark then turned to the children:  
“And you two! Try to hide as fast and good as possible! I don’t want them to get you, too!” This was the last thing he said to them and headed right to the human ship.

The fishman children decided to do as he told and when they were up to find a place to hide, they saw a bunch of humans with other fishman children, who struggled in their nets. This was the first time Maika ever saw humans in person and she identified them as pirates.

The two observed how the pirates were about to return to their ship with the kidnapped children. With a closer look in the net Hody gasped in shock and Maika quickly shutting his mouth, preventing him to blow up their cover.

“Why are you so in panic Hody?!” Maika asked him quiet.  
“There are Arlong’s sister and my friend Zeo in these nets with other kids! We have to save them, now!”

But Maika grabbed his arm, this lending him to question her act and she tried to explain it to the angered, young white shark: “Listen Hody, when you don’t understand the situation is when things are the most dangerous! You’ll be caught, too!”

“But...but I need to do something! We can’t let these dirty human pirates just get away with this!” He told the stingray girl with slight despair in his eyes.

“I understand you but we should try to follow them quietly instead! When they are returning to their ship, they need a way to get inside without getting stoke by electricity! And I’m sure we are able to do more, when me manage to follow them inside!”

After she said this, the little Hody nodded to signalize he understood her idea and the children started to follow the pirates quietly.  
During that Hody asked her, if she knows exactly what she’s doing and how they are supposed to act, once they were on board.   
Maika gave him a wide sharp-teethed smile, full of confidence: “Don’t worry, we are going to safe everyone and punish these pirates! Trust me, I have a gooood plan, ngahaha!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So what did we learn in this chapter?:  
> Arlong can do the math, Maika was as a child more like her Kagami persona, her mother Aegis was a megalomaniac psychopath and Hody Jones is an easy target for little Maika's shenanigans.
> 
> I originally wanted to made one entire chapter out of this flashback but that would be way, way too long so I decided to split.  
> Until the realease of chapter 6, it means: To be continued...


	6. Reminiscence and the Cyber Ship Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Second part of the flashback of little Maika showing her rediculous intelligence, Hody as an innocent child, Arlong being protective and kind but also very brutal at the same time.  
> Warning some violent scenes and attempted child murder

The 4-years old children Maika and Hody Jones silently followed the pirate, who kidnapped Arlong’s sister Shyarly and Hody’s friend Zeo together with other fishman children. The human was really close to the electrical-charged bubble, that made it impossible for enemies to infiltrate the big metallic ship. He was so arrogant and full of himself, that he didn’t even notice the two children directly behind him. Maika put her index finger in front of her mouth to signalize the captured children to be quiet.

“Deactivating current right in front of gate L-3!” The human pirate ordered trough a Den Den Mushi. And short moments after that, a little space opened for him to enter and they followed him.

This was the moment when Maika realized, that this was no bubble. Because when they went through the space, there was still water and the human still had his air bubble around his head. So they had to swim to the gate and it opened just for a brief moment, enough time to enter. It also closed itself again. First this strange electrical sphere and now gates, that open and close themselves. These pirates had really advanced technology…

When they were finally inside the strange ship, they were still underwater and had to swim a few meters to get to the surface. “They probably have that little space, to prevent their ship to get flooded with water...” Maika assumed.

Outside of the water, they saw that the ship had many corridors and so they had to follow the pirate closely without making a noise. It was pretty empty, maybe the majority of the crew was outside to catch more fishmen. They followed him a long path until they reached the room of the captain. On that way Maika gave Hody advice to walk the way to not get into the visual radius of the surveillance Den Den Mushi. The children were hiding and looked slightly over the edge to see what was happening. The room was big and round with a weird huge metallic device in the center with many buttons and screens. Maybe that was the control panel of the entire ship?

The Captain was turning around the chair he was sitting on to face his crew member. He was quite tall and muscular for a human male. His face was angular with a slimy smirk and had a poorly shaved brown beard and hair.

He looked at the catch his subordinate made and his smirk got even more disgusting when he turned his eyes to Shyarly: “Hihihi, look at that precious thing here. A makoshark mermaid...extremely rare. We can press a lot of money out of her so I can get more of these!”  
The very young mermaid looked absolutely terrified, when she heard him saying that and was playing with the little bag full of treasure in his hand.

“And we aren’t even done yet, Captain! Many others will return with more goods to sale!”  
He praised his captain with goods meaning the kidnapped fishmen. “Your invention is a total success Captain Device!”

After hearing that, Device giggled to himself a bit more and followed one of the biggest villain cliches ever: Explaining his big plan, while the heroes were listening: “With my great invention, the submarine, our crew will be able to travel the lower sea effortless and our advanced defense systems will get rid of any resistance! We can catch as many slaves as we want and make a whole lot of cash!”  
He turned around with his chair again and gave his subordinate the order to lock up the haul.

Hody was about to attack and to kill these bastards, who talk like that about his friends but was hold back by Maika. Attacking blindly would have been idiotic. There were things they had to do first, like saving the hostages, finding out more about this submarine machine and find a way to let Arlong and his friends enter this place to finish these humans off.

All the children were roughly thrown into a prison like cell and the pirate ordered the “future slaves” to be quiet and that they are getting more company soon. After he left, cackling mischievously to himself Shyarly began to curl herself up and suppressed to cry. 

Zeo came to the mermaid child and tried to comfort her.  
“Zeo, I’m scared...” She told him quietly, holding back some tears.  
“I know...we all are…” He answered, gently stroking her back with closed eyes.  
“I don’t want to be sold off. I want Onii-chan to come and safe us all.” The fact that a 3 years old little girl knew what “Sold of” meant, showed the horrible circumstances they lived in.  
“He sure will Shyarly. Arlong-san and the other big boys always protect us. And they will also safe Hody and that stranger girl, who sneaked themselves in here.”

Zeo couldn’t confirm anything of this, but he was a smart young boy, he knew that panic wouldn’t help. The comforting words he gave to Shyarly were also a last string of hope for himself. Like he said, they were all scared of their coming faith, if there really wouldn’t come any help.

When she was still hoping her big brother will come to safe her she heard the smooth voice of a little girl,  
“You called for help?”  
Shyarly and the other children were a bit scared when they saw Maika and Hody standing outside of the bars.  
“Hody are you alright?!” Zeo asked him the white shark boy surprised.  
“I could ask you the same thing. We are here to safe you.”

Hody turned to Maika with an optimistic smile and asked her:  
“So now we’re here. How are we going to get them out of the cell?”  
Maika remained silent. Very silent. A painful, awkward silence until she gave finally response:  
“Eh?”  
“What the heeeck!? Don’t tell me you didn’t think this through!?” Hody snapped and yelled at Maika.

The pirate, who locked them up heard the noise and decided to go back.  
The two kids started a very vocal fight with punching, kicking and everything else what belonged to a fight between little kids.

“I should never have listened to you!” Hody yelled. “So much for you brilliant plan, idiot!”  
“Oh, really?! If I hadn’t an annoying burden like you alongside me, everything would have been fine already!” Maika yelled back, tugging on Hody’s curls.  
“We should have left this to Arlong and the others! If we had just killed that one guy we used to sneak in, everyone wouldn’t be locked up here, you stupid useless stingray!”  
“That wouldn’t solve the problem! The submarine would still be here attacking us! You are the real idiot here!”

Soon the pirate arrived and stood behind the two: “Hey, how could you brats come on board?!”  
There was their chance. They took him by surprise, Hody bit him in the shoulder so Maika was able to safely use her tail and stung him in the arm. When the pirate fell down from the venom, Hody went to him, took the key and threw it to Maika so she could open up the cell.

“Ngahaha, my ‘Operation Pretended Fighting” was a total success, huh?” Maika cheered when the hostages left the cell.  
“Jahahaha!” Hody laughted in agreement. “Correct, but why does it feel like I got beat up way more?” Maika’s punches were really painful for a little girl.

They heard how the pirate curled himself up, screaming and moaning in pain, holding his stung arm. Maika saw how a disgusting swelling formed on his arm. That was her venom. The effect on fishmen was just numbness and a few days of fever but on humans the effect was different…worse...  
It caused terrible burning pain, muscle cramps and swellings that end up with infections through bacteria. And the worst part is, if not properly treated, the victim dies after around 6 days of suffering.

Maika actually hated the idea of using her tail as a weapon, but in this situation it was the most effective way to beat this pirate. She decided not to bother with this anymore even if it hurt. She already knew, may it be her venom or Arlong and his friends slaughtering them, noone of these human pirates will see the next day…

They ran down the corridors, lead by Maika. Captain Device saw them through his screens and was truly enraged about the brats’ insolence: “They are escaping with my precious haul!” He turned to the speaker Den Den Mushi and gave new orders to the crewmembers, who remained onboard:  
“Go capture the hostages!”

He then turned to the left and saw little Maika sitting on the control panel, about to steal his little bag of treasure.  
“Ah...you caught me.” The stingray girl ascertained with an embarrassed smile.  
The Captain freaked out and asked her, what in the New World she was doing. The answer was simple: Pushing a few buttons like the one to deactivate the electric sphere and opening a few gates to allow the fishmen from outside to enter.

When Device tried to catch her, she jumped laughing from the control panel. She let herself being chased around for a while until she ran out of the captain’s room after she saw Arlong and a few others finally entered the submarine.

“Fuck! More intruders!” Device cursed and closed the gates preventing more water to come in. He sat down and dedicated his attention to his screens and control panel.  
“Hihihi, that doesn’t need to be bad…I will catch and sell off all of you!”

Maika returned to the other kids, who waited outside for her and they followed the next step of the plan: Fining Arlong or one of his friends.  
They had to run a while and passed many corridors but it was rewarding. Finally they met up with the young sawshark. Shyarly, who was carried by Zeo on his arms, got teary eyes when she saw her brother:  
“Oniiiii-chaaannn!” She called for him and he ran even faster to them, when he saw and heard her.

In a matter of seconds he ripped her out of Zeo’s hands and gave her a big hug, sighing in deep relief. He asked her if she was fine and the humans didn’t hurt her. She looked up to him in his arms and gave him an answer: “I’m fine Onii-chan. The humans didn’t hurt me. Before they could, these two tricked and defeated him to get us out.” Shyarly pointed on Maika and Hody.

Arlong looked down to them with a confused glare. It was hard for him to believe, that these kids were able to sneak on board and release the hostages. However at the same time he was impressed and praised them for their accomplishment.

“Thanks Arlong-san, we two were so amazing, that human scum didn’t see our ambush coming!”  
Hody boasted, hiding the fact that this was all just Maika’s idea. Maika herself decided to remain silent and let him have his five seconds of glory.

“Okay, now that you are all safe it’s time to bring you out of here so me and my friends can take care of these humans.” Arlong determined, wanting to keep the children out of the danger.

But Maika had other plans and interfered: “Wait Arlong-kun! Here is some kind of control panel on board and if we are able to destroy it first, these humans can no longer use their ships technology!”  
“Sounds like a good plan but...” Arlong doubted. “Here are many corridors. Do you actually know where it is?”

Before Maika was able to answer this, the group of fishmen was suddenly surrounded by lasers and was now caged. Arlong cursed and asked what this is supposed to be but he got his answer soon through a speaker:  
“Hahahaha, now I’ve got you, you stupid fish!” Captain Device’s voice was loud and victorious.

“I’ve caught every single one of you in a laser cage, with lasers so hot, you would fry in an attempt to leave!”  
“What?! That means Kuroobi, Hachi, Chew and the others are caught, too?!” Arlong shouted at him in shock and fury.  
“Exactly!” Device confirmed gleeful. “To be honest, I only intended to catch children but now I have some nice teenagers as well, who can do more physical jobs! I’m looking forward for the auction to sell you all, hahahaha!”

Device was finished with laughing and ended the transmission, leaving them their faith as future slaves. Arlong cursed the human race once more.

“So will the humans in the end sell us off? I’m scared Onii-chan...” Shyarly asked her brother under tears.  
“Why are the humans doing this to us? What have we done to them to deserve this?” Zeo asked himself loudly, trying hard to not fall into panic.

All the other children except Hody were scared as well, even Maika:  
“It’s over!” She sobbed.

“Hey, don’t cry kids!” Arlong tried to cheer them all up. “We should try to figure out what we should do!” Even if he had no idea how. But he was responsible for them, the big brother, he mustn't lose hope and must stay strong.

“Arlong-san is right! Don’t give up!” Hody agreed enthusiastic but it was filled with child nativity. “We are fishmen! Show more backbone!”

“I...I can’t do that...” The little stingray gave her best to bring out.  
Arlong gently shook his head, taking all of his strength to stay optimistic: “That’s not true. You’ll be fine!”  
“Yeah! Just try harder! You can do it if you try and work hard!” Hody added.

It was a simple method to make her feel better, they had good intentions but they didn’t know, that this was the last thing she wanted to hear.  
The tears in Maika eyes became more and more until she couldn’t hold it any longer and burst out:  
“I’m not fine!”

Her outburst took the two shark boys by surprise:  
“Mother and Father and everyone say exactly that, but I’m really not fine at all!”

It was a cry of despair from a little child in a life threatening situation but for reasons, he couldn’t explain, it was relateable for Arlong and sent his mind 12 years back, to the day his father left him…

“Dad, that is the Fishman District. What are we doing here?” A three years old Arlong asked confused.  
“That’s your new home Arlong.” His father told him with a stern voice.  
“But why? Here live orphans only...” He gasped shocked when he realized what his father was referring to.

Little Arlong’s eyes teared up and he clenched his father’s pants begging him not to do it: “Dad please no! Don’t do this! Don’t leave me alone! Mom is already gone, the humans took her with them...when you leave...what should I do? The humans will take me with them, too!”

His father wasn’t even looking at him when he grabbed his son and throw him a few meters on the ground and yelled at him: “You’re strong, so you’ll be all right alone, won’t you?! Don’t worry, like the others here, you’ll find a way to get along, you’ll be fine!”

With this he turned around and was on his way to go. His son rubbed, crying the dirt from his face away and begged him loud and desperate: “Please take me with you! Dad! Come back, don’t go!”

But he didn’t turn around…

After Arlong recovered from this painful memory he sighed deeply, kneed down, placed his hand on Maika’s head and said to her as calm and gentle as he could:  
“I’m sorry Maika-chan. You’re not fine at all, are you? You’ve really trying to keep it together. And because you kept it together, no one understands. My situation to also feel this way may be different but I understand you. Sometimes it’s okay to not keep it together...”

Maika was surprised and touched by his words. She rubbed her tears away and looked up at him with big eyes.  
He then turned his head to the other children and continued with his speech:  
“But right now, we can’t give up. Our lives are way too precious to be taken away by filthy humans! We are better than they’ll ever be and we have to show them their place!”  
“Yeah!” The fishkids cheered with new found courage.

“So and now we think of the perfect solution for us fishmen, right Maika-chan?!”  
Arlong turned back to her but he didn’t expect, what he saw.

Maika was kneeing and pressed her left cheek on the floor with a very stupid smile and while she was tipping on the ground she mumbled stuff like: “Uuuuhhhh, so it’ll come in like this. And then that will go like this. And this is then like that and, ngahahaha...”

“Ahhhh, Maika-chan! Stop being broken!” Arlong freaked out. “Come on Maika-chan, when you’re acting like that after I hold such a touching speech I look like a total idiot!”

He and Hody began to shake Maika a bit to bring her back to her senses until she suddenly yelled:  
“Shut uuup!” They were all silent.

“I was just thinking for a second. Just leave this to me and Arlong-kun.” She explained irritated and Arlong was a bit surprised, that she mentioned him. The young stingray had a brilliant plan and the sawshark was a key element of that. She climbed up on his shoulder and whispered her idea into his ear.

He listened closely and ripped his eyes wide open, when she was finished.  
“That is brilliant! But are you sure this will work?!” He asked the little girl on his shoulder, impressed but also sweating nervous.  
“Yup.” Little Maika nodded smiling. “I’m more than certain, that’s going to work. All I need to do now is to rely on your skills.”  
“No, problem leave it to me, I trained exactly this after all, shahahaha!”

The other kids and also Device, who watched everything, had no idea what these two were up to and decided to just watch.  
Step one: Arlong gave his little sister into Hody’s care.  
Step two: Arlong conjured a few water drops in his right hand  
Step three: Maika closed her right eye and formed with the thumps and index fingers of both hands a rectangle to look through.

It took a few seconds of adjusting and Maika humming, the tension was unbearable but then she pointed on one exact point on a wall and nodded to Arlong.  
“Exactly this spot?” He asked.  
“Yup, exactly this one and no millimeter away!” Maika confirmed.

So Arlong took in a position as if he was ready to shoot the drops of water. He waited, waited for a signal.  
“And go!”  
“Yabusame!”

Right in the moment after Maika gave him the signal, he fired the drops and they bounced off the walls as if they were following a path…

“What was that supposed to be and what shall we do now?” Zeo asked confused, not knowing what their intend was with this action.  
“Just wait and see.” They explained, both smirking.

In his room Device was cackling to himself when he saw this: “Hihihaha, what a last desperate attempt to escape but it’s no use, this is the end for these foolish fish creatures.”  
But suddenly he heard a loud noise next to his, as if something very fast crashed into metal.  
“Wh...What...How?! This can’t be!”

Suddenly all the lights turned off and the laser cage disappeared. It was very dark but the fishmen from the Fishman District could see quite well since they were used to darkness.  
“This way guys!” Maika ordered and ran ahead with the others following her.

Hody, who gave Shyarly back to Arlong asked the stingray how she is able to see in these dark corridors, when she was from the bright city. Her answer was:  
“I really don’t see so well, I just remember passing through this hall one before. Don’t worry leave it to me.”

They ran a while but soon Maika lead them to the Captain’s room, which was dimly lit, maybe some emergency system to illuminate important rooms. There arrived, they saw that Device ran away and that the device panel was destroyed in a way as if a canon ball made impact with it. Hody decided to examine it further. On the impact site Hody noticed...water? Arlong’s Yabusame?!

“It destroyed the control panel? But why is it here…?” He asked.  
Placing her hands on a hips prideful, Maika explained: “Why? You saw it a few minutes ago, didn’t you?”  
“A few minutes ago?” The white shark boy seemed even more confused but he decided to think further:

“Eh? But wait? That doesn’t make sense...How did the drops get from all the way over there?”  
But then the hard bolt of realization struck him and he couldn’t believe what just happened:  
“It, it can’t be...You’ve gotta be kidding me!? To hit such a faraway unseeable place like control panel...You calculated every single angle of reflection of would take to reach it?!”

“Ngahahaha! Ngahahaha!” Maika laughed victorious. “Exactly, you’re right! But it wasn’t difficult to remember and calculate all of this to be honest. But your flabbergasted face is hilarious.”

Hody’s mind couldn’t really handle, what just happened. “You don’t learn insane stuff like this in school...she learned this all by herself and she is four! I’m never gonna make her mad ever again...” And so he decided, Maika was scary.

“Ooh, I feel you Hody.” Arlong told him with a wide grin. “I was also shocked about that plan and that it actually worked. Maika-chan is her very own league!”  
The praise of the sawshark boasted her ego even more…

“Anyway, kids, let’s find my brothers so we can take these humans down! Now it’s our turn, it’s payback time!”  
“Yeah!”

On their way to find those humans they met up with all of Arlong’s friends on the way. This went for quite a while until they arrived in a big hall filled with all the pirates, that remained inside, around 30, and those had all their swords ready. Device, driven mad because of their insolence:  
“Now you’re in my trap you fish! I don’t care about to sell you anymore! I just want to slaughter each and every one of you disgusting fish! Especially you little brat with the gray hair and the blue eye marks!”

There was a short moment of silence before Arlong started to laugh, ridiculing Device:  
“Shahahahaha! You really wanna try to slaughter us, you pathetic humans?! But I tell you it’ll be the other way around!”

Maika looked up to Arlong after he sat Shyarly down and noticed, that something has changed after he said that. His eyes became pinpricks and his entire expression changed and looked as if he was ready to tear every human apart there is. Also his already deep and threatening voice (too deep for a 15 year old) became even more threatening:

“First you made the mistake to arrive here in the first place, then you made the mistake to take fishman hostages and then you made your third mistake...You dirty, pathetic, inferior, cowardly creatures kidnapped these innocent children and one of them is my sister, you’ll perish a horrible death for this!”

It was like a start signal for an attack when Arlong screamed this and rushed to the humans. All of his friends followed him for the attack, except Hachi, who stayed in front of the children.  
“Don’t worry, nyuu! I’ll protect you with my swordskills!”

All what the little fishmen could do was watching. The fight was on an equal turn. The fishmen may were physical stronger but they were less armed and lesser in amount, however despite that they fought really well. The young Kuroobi and Chew were really skilled at beating the pirates down, Kuroobi even using the famous fishman karate.

Arlong on the other hand became a literal berserk, who didn’t hesitate to even use his sharp, deadly teeth to rip his enemies apart and cover his own clothes with their blood. He was filled with adrenaline and went on a total rampage, even three pirates at ones stood no chance against him. The shark just grabbed one’s head, crushed it and threw his lifeless body at the others to finish them off right after that.

It was a view, that terrifying and disturbing, that most of the kids had to look away even if they knew, he was fighting for them. Shyarly was even too shocked to look away, she was watching her big brother creating a whole massacre:  
“Wha...What happened to Onii-chan?” The mermaid asked, her voice was shaking. “I know Onii-chan can be grumpy sometimes but this is completely different...That’s not my nice and caring brother!”

“No, that’s not true Shyarly.” Maika said to her determined. “He’s doing this exactly because he is so caring. I don’t know him for long but this is something I can already tell. Arlong-kun is so brutal with them because he is really mad at them for trying to do you harm and now he’s taking them out so they can never try to hurt you again...”

Now that she calmed down his little sister, Maika wanted to go into the action as well. She didn’t want to just watch, she wanted to contribute more, especially when she knew how. And so she made the decision to sneak away from Hachi, who observed the fight.  
And when Maika was on her way, she noticed Hody was following her with the explanation, he wants to join her next cool action as well and she enjoyed the fact, that he started to really respect her.

They ran up a 5 meter high platform to observe everything from above and when they arrived there, the two saw Arlong ‘taking care’ of the remnants of a few pirates. He was very distracted by this, so distracted that he didn’t notice, that another one was sneaking behind him, ready to impale the shark with his sword.

Almost out of instinct, both kids jumped from the platform at the same time and kicked the pirate with the impact of their fall on his head, unconscious. When Arlong heard the noise behind him, he turned around and saw the kids sitting on an unconscious pirate.

“What are you doing here?! Go back to Hachi or you’ll get in danger!” He ordered, breathing harsh.  
He still had the glare of a monster and the whole blood on him didn’t make it any better. But the fact that he showed that he was worried about them made clear, that he was still able to make a difference between friend and foe.

“I’m sorry Arlong-kun.” Maika apologized, while having a quite smug smirk. “But Hody-kun and I couldn’t just stay still, doing nothing. Plus this scum under us wanted to stab you when you weren’t looking, we just helped you.”  
“You’re welcome.” Hody added with a large grin.

“Geez, you kids sure are something but that’s no bad thing. Just hide somewhere, there is still a bit more trash to be taken out.” He smiled proud at them and returned to his business.

However the problem wasn’t solved yet, because the prior reason why Maika wanted to go up to the platform was because she saw Captain Device hiding up, like a coward while his crew members got massacred. He sat between a bunch of tuns shivering in fear but also boiling rage:

“It’s her fault...” He mumbled, teeth crunching. “It’s all that brat’s fault! If it wasn’t for her, everything would’ve been fine! How is it possible for a little fish brat to cause so much trouble?! She is dangerous...I must kill her on an instant before she’ll do even worse things...”

Device took his sword, went to the edge of the platform and saw the little stingray girl with the gray hair right below him. Her appearance disgusted him so much. He wanted to stab, to slice, to slaughter this little child until it’s just a pathetic bunch of blood and meat. 

With making as less noise as possible, he jumped off the platform, aiming for the girl. Arlong looked up and saw this, he wanted to warn her but everything went so fast, he couldn’t bring out his voice.

But instead of seeing Maika at the end of Device’s sword, she jumped aside as if she directly saw him attacking.  
“How?! How could you dodge that!” He asked her furious  
She couldn’t really explain it herself but without seeing or hearing him, Maika knew exactly where and when the attack came from, like she was...sensing it…

The little moment of confusion she had was enough time for Device, grabbing her neck and pulling her up, preparing his sword to impale her. He looked at her with furious eyes and yelled with huffing in it: “You….YOU! You wretched brat cause more trouble, than you’re worth! I’ll end your life right here! Right now! So you won’t be able to cause any more trouble anymore!”

Maika’s expression showed how terrified she was, she was fearing for her life with wide teary eyes and her shivering body. Device enjoyed how afraid she was and kept his sadistic smirk even when Hody tried to help Maika but was kicked aside in the stomach by him.

When he was ready to finish the little stingray off he was confused by how her expression changed. Instead of that terrified whiny face was now a wide mischievous, almost demonic grin on her face.

“What’s with that grin you brat?! Don’t you realize, that you’re in big trouble right now?!”  
In response, Maika started to giggle with this grin on her face: “Ngahahahaha...Oh, I think you don’t realize your situation yourself. You are the one in big trouble here.”

“She’s damn right!” Decive heard a deep voice saying right behind him, when his wrist was grabbed by a big and strong hand. He first didn’t find the courage to turn his head around but when he finally did he was more than frightened.

A young Arlong stared down at him with a wide grin, covered in blood, which was absolutely not his and said to him slowly but serious: “Let down of the little ray, human scum!”

Device did as he told, even if it was unknowingly. Maika dropped on the ground but managed to land on her feet. Hody ran to her to see if she was fine, what she was. They decided to return to Hachi and the other children and they witnessed that Arlong’s friends already killed all the other pirates and the only one left was Device, who was in Arlong’s grip.

“Shahahaha! You sure are desperate and cowardly! After already knowing, that you lost your last action as a captain is failing in killing a little girl, what is more precious, than an entire army of yours? How pathetic.” The shark ridiculed.

“No...no...I can’t lose against dirty fish folk! Especially not against brats like you...”  
These were Device last words before his neck was crushed by Arlong’s bare hand.

The sawshark dropped the dead body of the disgusting pirate and went with his friends to the children with the words: “Alright kids, problem solved time to finally go home!”

“Is it finally over Onii-chan?” Shyarly asked, when she was picked up by her brother.  
“Yes, it is Shyarly-chan. I promised you to always protect you, and as you can see, I didn’t broke my promise.”

They walked down the corridors for the last time to fine a gate, what they could use to escape.

On the way Maika observed the older ones and witnessed how in the adrenaline slowly left their bodies and Arlong’s eyes also returned back to normal. She heard him mumbling: “These humans deserved it...They wanted to enslave my sister and the other kids...killing them was just right, in that way they can never do that again...”

The way he said this, it sounded like he wasn’t used to this. That rampage and that fight with these pirates, was that the first time each one of them had ever killed?

Soon they found a gate and when Arlong wanted to open it, it was already doing it by itself. No, it was pushed open by someone from outside. And when it was finally open they saw a really tall, salmon pink skinned adult sea bream fishman in his mid 30s with black straight hair, wearing a white tank top.  
“Are you all fine?! My god Arlong you’re all bloody what happened?!” He asked worried.

Suddenly Arlong had a wide smile on his face, expressing that he was clearly joyed to see that man:  
"Big Brother Tai!” He cheered. “Tai!” His friends and the other kids did so as well except Maika.

However the fist act they took was swimming away from the submarine, back down to the Fishman District. Down there they met an adult whale shark fishman in his early 20s wearing a kimono, who was called Brother Jinbe by Arlong. He told that he and Tai took care of all the humans outside, also the young Hyouzou eliminated some of them himself with his advanced swordsmanship despite his age.

“And why are you all bloody?” Jinbe asked the sawshark.  
“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you everything later.” The water washed most of the blood away, however his clothes were still stained.

“Geez, Arlong you’re right we’ll talk about that an other time.” Tai approved. “But we are not far away from your apartment Arlong, so go and change your clothes! The kids shouldn’t see you like this any longer or not at all!”  
“Urgh, yes, you’re right big brother. I’ll be back soon, have an eye on Shyarly-chan.”

In the time Arlong was gone, the children returned to their so called home followed by Arlong’s friends to have an eye on them. Zeo, who wanted to tell their friends Daruma, Ikaros and Dosun from the events of this day left as well. The only ones left were Hody, Shyarly and Maika and the two adults.

Tai and Jinbe noticed, that they haven’t seen her before and mentioned that.  
“Oh, I’m from the city, I just came down here for reasons and got somehow involved with all of this.” She explained. “Hody-kun and I had a little quarrel but Arlong-kun stopped us and he even wanted to escort me back home.”

“Ah, yes that’s just like Arlong.” Tai stated smiling. “Don’t let yourself mislead by his looks but he really likes kids and is helpful. Behind this grumpy, human-hating appearance is a kind and caring heart.”

Maika already assumed exactly this especially because he was so nice to her and all the others and so she tried to defend him for the blood on him:  
“Please don’t be mad at him but he and his friends killed lot’s of people just to protect us. They wanted to sell them all of including his sister and the captain also wanted to kill me but he saved me!”

“Yeah, the way he said ‘Let go of the little ray, human scum!’ was soooo cool!” Hody recalled.

Jinbe was surprised by this but he could smile at this as well: “Looks like he had damn good reasons to do this...” And Tai just nodded with a tired sigh.

Usually Maika really didn’t like killing but she forgave Arlong and his friends since their intentions were good and there was nothing she could’ve done against it anyway.

Soon after that Arlong returned with clean clothing and picked up his sister again.  
“So, time to bring you back home Maika-chan.”  
“Oh, okay...” She was sightly disappointed because she actually really liked the people she met in the Fishman District.

On the way to the exit came a question into the stingray’s mind when she observed the conversations between Arlong, Jinbe and Tai:  
“Oh, Arlong-kun you call these two your brothers. Are you really related?”  
“No, we aren’t.” Jinbe confirmed. “The only blood relatives here are Arlong and Shyarly and they’re just half-siblings.”

Tai explained, that since the Fishman District is a big orphanage, having a blood relative is really rare but a few groups joined together and live like a family.

“Correct, we love and respect each other like brothers and sisters. We are a family and take care at each other like one.” Arlong explained convinced. “Listen Maika-chan, a true family isn’t decided by blood, it’s decided on the people, who are the most precious to you, you want to protect on any cost and who would do the same for you, in other words your fiends or better your nakama.”

“Nakama...” Maika frowned when she repeated this one specific word. Despite having biological parents, she never really felt like they were a real family and she never had any friends either.

“Sheesh, Arlong don’t speak so complicated with her. She’s still really young, she doesn’t understand this.” Jinbei chided the sawshark, who disagreed.  
“You’re wrong Brother Jinbe, Maika-chan gets it. This little girl is really smart. To be honest, we wouldn’t have made it if it wasn’t for her.”

“Wait, what?” Tai and Jinbe asked confused, looking down on the stingray.

“Arlong-san is right!” Hody confirmed. “It was her idea to sneak into the ship, tricking a human to save the others and opening the gates to let Arlong-san and the others in! When we were in, we all were caught in a laser cage, everything seemed hopeless but after a little motivation speech, Maika came to the idea of sending Arlong-san’s Yabusame all the way to the control panel! And when we fought those humans, we two ran up a platform and knocked a human out, who was up to attack Arlong-san from behind like a coward. Also when the human captain attack Maika from above without making any noise, she just jumped aside! Maika is cool!”

The way Hody talked about her made her blush and giggle in embarrassment but also boasted her ego. It surprised her how drastically the opinion on each other changed, she actually liked him as well.

While Arlong patted the two on their heads with pride, acknowledging how clever and gutsy both were, the adults just stared down in absolute disbelieve, both thinking: “What kind of insane kid is this?! This isn’t normal!”

Now Tai also patted them and told them: “He’s right you seem to be very clever and gutsy for 4 years olds to handle such a dangerous situation like champs, especially you Maika-chan.”  
“Thank you Tai-san.” She appreciated his praising words.  
“But also really reckless!”  
“Huh?”  
“I may have worked this time but who knows about next time. You’re still a little kid remember that.”  
“Yes, Tai-san...”

“Sheesh, this kind of recklessness reminds me of Arlong.” Jinbe mentioned. “Listen kids, don’t idolize Arlong. This guy has the talent to always get himself in trouble.”  
“Hahaha, you’re right Jinbe!” Tai added. “Our little punk is a total troublemaker, hahaha!”  
“Brothers don’t embarrass me in front of the kids!” Arlong complained, blushing in a deep purple.  
The three kids and the two adults laughed joyful.

They arrived the point where Maika were able to return back safety.  
“Well...this is the goodbye, huh?” Maika asked rhetorically.

“Awww, I don’t want you to go Maika!” Hody complained. “Please come here more often.”  
“Sorry Hody but it’ll be better if not.” Arlong interfered strict but calm.  
“But why Arlong-san?! We three are a good team! When we work even harder we can become an amazing pirate crew, that can defeat every human!”

“Simple, because she doesn’t belong here. Maika-chan is from wealth and she should stay in that more secure environment. She shouldn’t have more to do with this shady place than she already does.”  
Tai and Jinbe nodded at Arlong’s unexpected maturity on this topic.

“Hody-kun, it hurts to admit it but that’s right.” The stingray girl admitted with a soft smile. “My mother will slaughter me when she finds out, that I’m sneaking out to meet up with people from the Fishman District. Plus I can’t become a pirate because I’ll become a phantom thief!”

“I still don’t get this phantom thief thing...”  
“You’ll see in a few years when I’m everywhere in the media” She cheered.

“You’re right.” Shyarly told Maika, what slightly. “You’ll become a famous thief with a mask and an elegant blue tuxedo, loved by seafolk and humans equally.”  
Without knowing of Shyarly’s fortune telling powers, Maika just appreciated her concern. “You’re right! In addition, I already stole some precious treasure from the human captain.”

She put out the little bag of treasure, she had attached on the ribbon around her waist. The older ones were impressed by her achievement but were more impressed by her next act:

“Here, that’s for you Arlong-kun.” Holding the treasure towards him.

“Whaaaaaat?!” Everyone else asked her shocked.  
“I’m not kidding, I give it to you as a present. I’m rich enough and you need it more.”  
They couldn’t believe what was happening.  
A little child stole valuable treasure and gives it away to some punk...that stingray was special through and through…

Arlong didn’t hesitate to take her present and giving her a brotherly hug with one arm to show his gratitude.

“Oh, and before I go.” Maika brought up, and pulled her Den Den Mushi out of her satchel.  
“I want to take a photo with Arlong-kun, Hody-kun and Shyarly to remember this day, if that’s okay of course.”  
They didn’t see it coming but they all agreed and Jinbe was the one to take the photo.  
Arlong kneed down with his sister on his left shoulder and wrapped his arms around the children with everyone smiling happy.

After Jinbe returned the Den Den Mushi with the photo, Maika bowed in gratitude and began to swim away. After around 10 meters, she turned around one last time to say to everyone while waving:  
“Goodbye everyone! It was short and dangerous but I deeply enjoyed it! I hope we can see each other again someday under good occasions!”

“Goodbye Maika! Thank you for everything!” Came from Shyarly.  
“Take care little one!” From Tai and Jinbe.  
“See you again Maika! And when we met next time, let’s become a great team!” From Hody.  
And finally from Arlong with thumb up and wide smirk: “Stay amazing as you are Maika-chan and you’ll become a strong and smart symbol of us fishman!”

Back in the present

“My gosh how could I ever forget about this eventful day even if it was over two decades ago?!” Maika asked herself loudly, laughing at that fact.  
“I don’t know how I could forget to have met such an amazing young girl. Well I think the photo fulfilled its purpose, shahahaha!” Arlong had to laugh at that fact as well.

“Good that my parents never found out, that I sneaked out.” Logically the conversation with Aegis was something only Maika could remember and she hid this on purpose.

Both returned to collecting the dropped photos but without looking at more of them and when they were finished, Maika took the book and stood up. When she did that, she heard Arlong asking himself: “Now, when I’m thinking about it...how’s the little Hody Jones doing? Haven’t see him in years...”

“I know, what became out of Hody...” Maika answered quietly but loud enough for Arlong to hear:  
“Oh, really? Would you tell me, Maika-chan?”  
“I have a good idea, when Kuroobi and Chew are done with their work we can take a little break where I can tell you guys everything, that including the incident on Fishman Island.”

That hooked Arlong and made him really curious. But Maika turned around and went to a pile of books she made out of books she didn’t need anymore and wanted to get rid off.  
As response to Arlong’s question of why she wanted to get rid of a photo album of her childhood was: “I have no use for it. No photo is relevant to me especially because I don’t have many photos of positive childhood memories.”

After she placed the album on the pile, she put one certain photo into the pocket of her hoodie with the very quiet words:  
“Except this one. I’m gonna keep this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man I love how this chapter ended up like, it's my favorite so far. The most fun to write was of course the chapter's main trio: Maika, Arlong and Hody Jones. Fisher Tiger, Jinbe and Zeo had to be in there as well (plus Hyouzou cameo).


	7. Agreements with Stingrays are Painful

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maika and Hachi talk about the incident on Fishman Island. And Maika is a very painful teacher and alarm clock.

The sawshark and the stingray fishmen continued to clean up the huge library for around two hours until the door bell rang and Maika headed down to check on who it was.

On the way downstairs she met with Kuroobi and Chew who both just finished their cleaning tasks.  
With mild satisfaction Maika ordered them to join the more than bored Arlong in the library since nobody should know, they were living with her. However in that particular context she wasn’t worried because she already knew, who was behind the door.

It was Hachi with a bunch of takoyaki, greeting the mansion’s owner with his typical large and joyful smile. She invited him to join and to bring some good food as the only member of the circle, who can actually cook.

“Guys! Come down, time to take a break! Hachi is here with takoyaki!”  
She never saw all three of them running so fast and she couldn’t blame them, Hachi’s food was a class for itself. And most likely Arlong really needed a time-out from all these books.  
“Thank you for coming Hachi-kun. You know we are about to clean my house a bit and I have a giant library so I would ask you if you like to help us please. Your six arms would be really helpful you know.” Maika asked the octopus man while eating with a false sweetness.  
To his endless kindness, Hachi could never reject a request from a kind lady.

The other three came behind this immediately and in their heads were the same thoughts:  
“That and the food are the reasons why you invited him in the first place, witch...”

“Ey, Maika-chan you told me that, when we’re taking our break you would finally tell us what in the world happened on Fishman Island.” Arlong reminded her while taking a few bites.  
“Correct, good thing that Hachi-kun is here because he was present during the incident.”  
Her statement surprised them. 

They never expected Hachi to be there when it happened, so he could always add something in case Maika missed something since she didn’t knew all the details and vise versa. The fishmen leaned back and listened to Maika telling the story with a stern face.

“Sooo, where should I start? Okay, it was like this. It formed a pirate crew down there called the New Fishman Pirates. A crew made out of fishmen from the Fishman District and by them enslaved humans. They were crucial and strongly believed in fishman superiority.”  
“Nyuu, even more than you Arlong-san.” Hachi added.  
“Their pride was so rotten, they even weren’t afraid to hurt and kill other fishmen and merfolk when they disagreed with them or even dying themselves for their distorted ideals. Their big plan was throwing over the entire Ryugu kingdom and murdering the royal family to take over for themselves. One of their actions were forcing the citizens to step on photos of Queen Otohime and a public execution of the royal family. Fortunately they were stopped and imprisoned.”

When Maika finished, she looked on the faces of her listeners and witnessed on all of them gazes of complete shock and disgust, Arlong especially seemed very upset about that. He gulped briefly and finally managed to bring out his words:

“What the actually fuck is wrong with those people?” He asked absolutely revolted while looking down on the table.  
“How dared they to take the ideal of fishman superiority and used it for their own foolish ambitions?! Hurting our own kind, even themselves, ridiculing and attempting to execute the royal family...I knew Queen Otohime wanted friendship between fishmen and humans, something impossible to happen but that is by far no excuse for these disgusting acts! The lives of fishmen and merfolk are so precious, how dare they to throw them away like that?!” His fists trembled and his eyes were wide open in pure anger and disappointment. “Who in the world was the leader of these foolish pirates?!”

“Hody Jones...”

Arlong stared at Maika in total disbelief: “You’re kidding right?!”  
“I’m surely not kidding Arlong-kun.” Maika explained with pain and sadness in her expression.

“When you asked about him was the moment when I decided to finally tell you. Yes, Hody Jones and his comrades, who ones were his friends are fully responsible for this.”  
“To make matters worse...” Hachi added sadly. “They used Energy Steroids to boost their power but reduced their lifespan! They took your ideal and expanded it to a more than disgusting extreme.”

Maika felt an equally disappointment as Arlong and when Hachi went to the bathroom she told him this.  
“You don’t have to say more Arlong-kun, I can see everything in the look in your eyes. If I, if Kagami would have been there to this point, I would’ve taken care of him and all of his 100.000 men by myself!”

Their faces turned sweaty and intimidated when Maika stated she would’ve been able to defeat all of them all alone.

“Maika-san, how strong are you actually?” Kuroobi asked this legitimately question to distract from the strongest nauseous they have felt in a long time.

Maika, getting his intention responded with crossed arms and legs: “I don’t know to be honest. I never power-scaled myself before and doing something like this is really hard. Example, I may have easily defeated Magellan, who is one of the strongest forces of the government, not admiral level but still very strong. But that doesn’t has to mean I’m stronger than him because I used a trick to completely immobilize him. So everything is very situational but I guess I’m very strong? After all I trained for two decades. I have lots of battle experience and my high intelligence is a very big advantage, too. Oh, and of course you shouldn’t forget about my logia devil fruit and my observation haki.”

“Long story short, you’re damn powerful and someone you don’t want to have as opponent?” Chew summarized and Maika approved this with mild nodding.  
“Guess you can say so. Not that this matters anyway, a phantom thief doesn’t fight anyway. I only have fighting skills for self defense.” The stingray told her small audience and took a bite of takoyaki.

“Wasted talent...” The manta ray mumbled while eating.  
“I heard that Kuroobi-kun. Think what you want but I’m very stubborn about doing things my way, no one can tell me what to do and I say, as a phantom thief I’ll only fight if truly necessary and I don’t kill no matter what.”

Her ideology with doing things the way she wanted but never killing really reminded all three of them on Fisher Tiger and that bothered Arlong even more than he was before. Not killing fishmen was a mentality he could totally go with since he did the same but also not killing humans...he saw what that lead to...however there was nothing he could change about that. 

He knew how intelligent and intellectual Maika was, she definitely was informed about what happened to Fisher Tiger like everyone else.

Except the true cause of death. Everyone knew the reason of his death, the betrayal of the humans but the cause of death, Tiger refusing human blood because of their horrible betrayal was a secret every sun pirate will take into their grave.

However the knowledge about the lie Arlong spanned years ago to protect Tiger’s honor must’ve been enough to not having mercy with humans and that’s why he didn’t understand Maika on that. But there also has to be added that he didn’t understand Maika at all even if he really wanted to.

When she mentioned phantom thief, Maika snapped her fingers and announced: “Talking about my business, I thought a moment about it and decided to tell Hachi-kun about my secret. It’ll be better this way...”

“Finally!” All three fishmen shouted out in sync.

The reason she changed her mind was that Hachi didn’t interfere when she covered up the fact, that it was technically Arlong’s fault to the most part, that Hody and the others of the New Fishman Pirates turned out the way they did even if that result surely wasn’t intended by him. However even with covering up that fact, she noticed how Arlong partly started to realize it by himself and to feel guilty. And just by staying silent, Hachi proved himself as trustworthy of keeping her secret.

Speak of the devil, the octopus fishman returned back to them asking innocent what he missed.

“Nothing very important.” Maika told him kindly before her facial expression changed to a more serious attitude. “Hachi-kun, listen closely. I’m going to tell you a secret that is very very important to me and I want you to promise me to keep it for yourself. Arlong-kun, Kuroobi-kun and Chew-kun already know of it.”

“But of course I can do that. Just tell what it is and my lips are closed forever, nyuu!”  
With that she decided to not talk long around the topic and got right to the point:  
“I am Phantom Thief Kagami.”

An awkward silent occurred and the only sound was the ball of takoyaki that felt off of Hachi’s chopsticks.

“Say something, this is awkward!” Maika complained loud, flushing in embarrassment.  
“Uhh, this was just so direct, it made us practically speechless.” Arlong commented with a chuckle.

It was the contrast that was so funny to Arlong. Sometimes she just talked in riddles to avoid questions or just to tease them and sometimes she was so straight forward in telling things, it was almost painful.

“Y-you aren’t kidding, do you Lady Maika?” The octopus asked just to be sure, not completely believing what he just heard.  
“I’m sure not, I’m absolute serious about what I’m telling you right now. I am Wildcard Kagami, the famous Phantom Thief with the mysterious wind powers. Here I can prove it to you.” The stingray fishwoman said and pulled out something very familiar out of her blue hoodie jacket.

“That’s Kagami’s famous mask!” Hachi shouted pointing on the mask with one of his six index fingers. “So you really are Kagami...” He looked down with his voice getting more quiet.  
“If you need even more evidence, in my cellar are is a bunch of treasure, I stole in the past five years..” She added while pointing on the cellar.

Despite that, Hachi didn’t need more evidence, he believed every single word of what she said to him but he remained silent, that making Maika feel a bit uncomfortable. But a matter of seconds he grabbed Maika’s shoulders and looked at her with sparkles in his eyes:

“Amazing! Nyuu, that’s so amazing! Who would have thought that the cold and mysterious Lady Maika with the most shady reputation of all from the higher society is in secret the cool, idolized and unstoppable Kagami! I’m just so amazed, nyuu! You have no idea how much I admire you and your powers and smart brain but also your kindness and...”

After he finished fan-talking, Maika ordered him to let her go, what he did. His reaction to all of this was fortunately positive to the pleasure of everyone else.   
He also realized that it was her responsibility that Arlong and the other two were free now but they also most likely wouldn’t go for conquering anymore as long as Maika keept an eye on them. The fact that they were reunited again under way better circumstances thanks to this distanced and intimidating rich woman, who just revealed herself as the flashy and entertainer like idol figure, who just flies around the world, stealing treasure with announcement.

The stingray took a deep breath and asked one final question: “Now that you know my secret you are obliged to really keep it for yourself, you now have my full trust on this and I don’t want it to be disappointed.”  
“You can count on me Lady Maika!”

Now with the four fishmen and her Sensei were to this point five people in total, who knew her secret and she hoped it would stay by this number.

Hachi’s request to tell him some of her phantom thief stories was put aside for some other occasion because she wanted to make an announcement on the current phantom thief topic:  
“I decided to go on a heist around next week and am currently researching for a target.”

They were quite fascinated by this and really interested in how this will go, Hachi was a bit more enthusiastic than the rest. But she wasn’t done yet:  
“And now that you are here and Kagami craves for entertaining and excitement I want to ask you if some of you want to join me on the heist.”

“Eeehhh?! What did you say?!” The guys asked her in sync.  
“I asked you if some of you want to keep me company while stealing treasure. I thought the first time was clear enough. So what do you say?”

She gave them a moment to think about her offer, after all she was wanted with a bounty of 180 million berry and it wouldn’t take long for them to gain a bounty once more.

“I’m in!”

It was Arlong, casually bringing this out and looking determent at the stingray in front of him.  
“I’m serious, count me in! I don’t want to vegetate in this mansion with nothing to do. Even if your way of doing things is very different than mine, I’m ready to at least try it. It is a way to fight humans after all. But I have a request in exchange.”  
Maika was glad to hear that and was ready to listen to his request.

“I want you to train me! I want to get stronger even if you intended to take us with you as a handicap but after everything what happened, I don’t want to lose against humans anymore and of course for self defense. Would you do that?”

Just a few seconds later, Maika twitched with her left shoulder and simply responded:  
“Sure why not? How about we already start tomorrow?”  
.  
.  
.  
“Well that was easy...I thought it would be harder to convince you...” Arlong stated, raising an eyebrow. Maika did the same just with the response: “Like already mentioned, I don’t see a reason to reject your request. I don’t have much to do so I think it would be fun.”

With that Kuroobi and Chew decided to join as well but Arlong was surprised of Hachi staying silent on that topic:  
“Hey Hachi, don’t you want to join, too?”

Not wanting to disappoint anyone, Hachi hesitated for a moment:  
“I’m sorry guys but I’m really happy with my current life with my takoyaki stand and when it would get official, that I’m allied with Kagami, this peaceful life would be impossible, I hope you can understand this, nyuu...”

Maika didn’t assume of Hachi to join in the first place for exactly this reason.  
Arlong’s enthusiastic smile faded away, he was disappointed but he smiled more calmly now, crossed his arms and his answer was: “Fine, yes I admit I was disappointed at first because that means you’ll always be a bit distanced from us but you’re still our dear brother and I’m glad for you that you managed to build yourself a nice and peaceful life. I’m ready to fully accept this but only when you come here every time you can, okay?”

Hearing this let Hachi have an outburst of tears, sobbing and gratitude while he promised doing exactly that and he got a lot of pats of comfort on the back from everyone.

The five fishmen spent the rest of the day with cleaning the mansion with the giant library taking most of the time. And when everything was finally done, Arlong was the first one who just fell in his bed, even before Hachi even left. To have some mercy with the sawshark, Maika made the decision to not forcing him to see books for a long time.

They all went with Maika’s idea of starting the first training session on the very next day and they all got up early, well everyone except Arlong. This guy was still asleep even if the other two tried to wake him up, with that Maika decided to take matters into her own hands.

They went to Arlong’s bed and stood next to it, watching the sawshark curled up, hugging his blanket and of course snoring. Maika poked his shoulder a few times with no reaction at all.  
“He looks very peaceful, it would be almost a shame to rip him out of this peaceful state.” Maika stated with a sympathetic look on her face however…  
“Anyway, we had an agreement so time to throw the idiot out of there.”

The “throw” part was meant totaly literally by her. Without any words she grabbed the bed-frame and flipped it with full force, that causing Arlong to land upside down on the other side of the large room with a loud “thump” and “Ouch!”.

The now awake Arlong got up to his feet and asked enraged: “Who the fuck did this!?”  
“Here, it was me.” The stingray said bluntly with slight annoyance.

“I’m sorry Arlong-san, we didn’t know she would do that, chuu!” Chew apologized hysterical.  
“You don’t need to apologize for that, Chew-kun. Get your lazy ass up Arlong-kun we had the agreement to begin our training session early so get yourself together, we’re having breakfast and then we are heading to a lone island for our training!”

“Urgh, yes, ma’am I’m hurrying...” Arlong responded while rubbing the back of his head and indirectly complaining about her very bossy attitude. He was bossy himself and loved to take the lead but he was never that forceful...

He had a more than horrible sleep this night. The whole thing with Hody Jones still very bothered him. He constantly said to himself, if he would’ve been able to prevent this when he only went more into detail about how precious fishmen life is and how important it should be protected instead of only punishing humanity…

It was a trait, Arlong really hated on himself. When he felt really bad about something, it’ll bother him for a long time, there were still things he was very upset about, even if they happened years ago.

Anyway he decided to stay silent about it, like always since he didn’t plan on annoying his nakama with his problems.

Arlong joined the others, sat down and drank some of the coffee Chew already prepared for him. While swallowing his toast in one bite he saw Maika coming in from the outside with today’s newspaper in her hands. She sat down on her chair and casually read through it while chewing her toast. It was a normal breakfast until Maika jumped up from her chair, almost causing Chew to choke on his coffee.

“Maika-san, what’s wrong?! Did something horrible happen?!” Kuroobi asked worried.  
“Just look at this!” Maika ordered and threw the newspaper on the desk where everyone could see it. It showed that new bounties were released and one of them was Kagami’s.  
It showed: 360 million berry!

“Am I looking wrong or did your bounty just doubled?!” Arlong asked with dry voice and wide eyes.

As respond did Maika cross her arms with a proud grin while chuckling: “Ngahaha…looks like my little stunt in Impel Down really had an impact. The Marine knows how easy this was for me and so they start to consider me as an actual threat and not only as a nuiscence, ngahaha!”

“You are with 180 million already considered a thread Maika-san...” Kuroobi mumbled.  
They were really impressed by her achievement to just double her bounty.  
“It’s now higher than the one Big Brother once had...” Went through Arlong’s mind.

Maika, still very happy about Kagami’s new bounty announced that she’ll get an even higher one and that the whole world will hear from Kagami. She sure was ambiguous…

After they prepared everything, the four fishmen traveled to an island around one hour away from Maika’s island. It was full of nature and untouched by humans, with several forests, rivers and fields. They decided to go on a field to train on.

“Hey, what are you doing Maika-chan?! I thought we are training?!” Arlong complained when he saw how the stingray just sat down on.  
"You are right and our first step will be that I’ll observe your skills while you are training with each other. I can find the best individualized methods when I know your current strengths and weaknesses.” She got a point and so they did as she told and fought against each other, using their personal tactics.

Maika watched closely and witnessed besides very basic fighting skills, Fishman Karate in various forms. This went for around half an hour until she told them to stop and gave feedback:  
“Alright, this is the stuff I witnessed: We have a lot of work to do. You are really, really strong on East Blue level but I’m stealing all around the Grandline, I already decided to only take you on heists in Paradise but even then this will be hard for you sometimes when I’m not constantly paying attention on you and I can already tell that I will not do that! Chew-kun, your endurance is way to low, you’ll be knocked out rather quick but you are a talented sniper. Kuroobi-kun, your technique is really good but it lacks you in force. And you Arlong-kun, are the exact opposite of what I told Kuroobi.kun, oh, and you’re too slow.”

That was harsh but they already knew how blunt and direct she can be and she was honest with the feedback of her observation.  
“Okay...to my defense, this is the first time that I’m actually doing this seriously...” Arlong stated with his thumbs in his pockets.

“Wait...you never really seriously trained before in terms of combat is what you are trying to say…?” Maika asked after being speechless for a few moments and he confirmed this.  
“Are you fucking kidding me?!” The stingray walked shocked to him with a tiny bit of anger and began to constantly poking him in his chest while speaking:

“No wonder, you didn’t come really far when you only relied on your natural strength you fool! Such cockiness is annoying! Kagami only acts like that as well because she is very trained, strong, experienced and smart, in that case this is called confidence! Follow me, now I’m gonna show you the difference between someone confident, who put hard work in their success and someone cocky!”

They surly didn’t expect Maika would lecture him so much and also how she walked a few meters away from them.  
“What are you doing Maika-chan?” The shark asked, raising an eyebrow.  
“Attack me!” Still turning her back on them.  
“What?”  
“Yup, attack me whenever you like. I won’t dodge. And don’t dare to hold back, I want you to attack me with all you got!”

They were confused by her action and Arlong didn’t really like the idea of attacking a woman from behind but since it was Maika, he was sure, that nothing bad would happen. He still didn’t understand her point though…

Anyway, he did as she told and brought himself in attacking position, waited a few seconds and jumped right to her, ready to throw a strong, devastating punch at the stingray.

It happened in less that a second, that Maika turned around, unfolded her arms and landed one single forceful kick against Arlong’s right side of his face. The impact sent him right into the depts of the woods. Everything went so fast, he wasn’t even able to show a single reaction.

After the shark flew away Maika’s eyes opened wide and she ran into the woods to look after him, Kuroobi and Chew, who recovered from their state of shock followed her.  
Maika knew exactly in what exact direction he flew and found him rather quick. What the three saw was Arlong, who just regained consciousness and regrew the teeth, Maika shattered.

She kneed down to him with an apologetic look and helped him to get up while saying:  
“I’m sorry Arlong-kun! I was so upset, I got reckless and put more force into my kick than I wanted! Are you okay?”

In respond Arlong said while rubbing his cheek in pain: “It’s fine...even though I start to feel the pain. Maika-chan you sure are amazing, I’ve never felt such a strong and fast kick before...”

Now that she made sure, that he was fine, she started to explain her intention behind this: “And that is the result of hard training! You can be born with a lots amount of talent, you can be born as a genius but when you never put effort to improve yourself, you won’t get far! You must work hard and always do you best! Do you get my point?”

Arlong sure did, even if it needed to be the hard way. Maika indeed proved, that she was really strong, even without her devil fruit and for this Arlong respected her even more.  
“I also get you point.” Kuroobi said serious. “There is a reason why our brother Jinbe became the second strongest of the Sun Pirates. He wasn’t just really talented, he always trained his Fishman Karate with full focus and seriousness.”

“That’s good and I expect a similar focus from you three as well. Because according to my observation and analysis, you have lots of potential to become really really strong and this is exactly what we are trying to archive here, right guys!”  
“Absolutely!”

Training with Maika was everything but nice. One time they should all try to attack her, he dodged everything as if it was nothing, while reading a book! Or the one time where she turned into Kagami and bombarded them with Air Bullets. They spent the entire day on the island with her monstrous training but none of them complained. They knew it ‘ll pay out in the end especially because it was so hard.

When they returned back to Maika’s mansion in the evening, they didn’t expect Hachi to wait for them outside with something to eat. He was asked by Maika to prepare something for them when they return back from training, they deserved something good after their hard work and Maika’s garbage cooking was nothing good.

“How was training?” Hachi asked innocent.  
“Draining...” All three answered exhausted with Maika chuckling in respond.

The rest of the day was quickly over, they just ate Hachi’s food, took a shower one after the other and then just fell into bed, falling asleep immediately.

The next day and the day after went the same but the forth day was a bit different.  
“I have to work today.” Maika announced. “Give me around five hours and then we can go on as usual.”With that she went into her workroom, that reminding the other’s that she had jobs to work on.

Arlong decided to take a nap in the armchair, Chew took a book from Maika’s library and Kuroobi meditated.  
After over three hours of Maika not coming out of her workroom Chew decided to make her a tea as an argument to look after her without getting chided by her.  
After he prepared the tea he knocked on the door but with no respond. He knocked again and again but still no response. He was slightly worried and opened the door to look inside and he didn’t expect what he just saw.

Maika sat behind a big desk full of documents and folders and she worked on them in an insane speed and focus. She stared at them like they were the only thing in the world and she was constantly writing on documents while sorting other documents. The way she did it was insane, almost like a machine on autopilot, it was creepy.

“Uhm, Maika-san…?” Chew tried talking to her but was plain ignored or she didn’t notice him at all. Slowly he began to walk closer to her and watched how she was still working in that hyper-focused almost unnatural way. 

Even when he stood right next to her, he didn’t caught her attention so he decided to tap her on the shoulder and finally he had a reaction, She was frightened and looked angry at Chew for scaring her like that and asked him what the hell he was doing.

“I made you some tea, chuu...”  
“Oh, really?” She asked, realizing the situation. “Well...thank you Chew-kun...” And took the cup. “But don’t interrupt me during work again, I’m a very focused worker okay?”  
Chew was alright with that and left her alone again.

When he returned to his friends, he told them what he witnesses. Kuroobi was equally speechless, only Arlong was able to say something to it:  
“Well she isn’t just in combat a monster. That woman is a freaking genius. She always was I, realized this 26 years ago...”  
“26 years ago?” His friends asked him.  
To kill some more time, Arlong told them the story how he and Maika met for the first time.

That coincidence was insane, when and how they met and hearing about the method the 4 years old Maika used to get rid of the laser cage was insane and hard to believe a little kid was able to do that. Arlong wouldn’t have buy it himself if he himself wasn’t part of the plan.

After another two hours passed Maika finally joined them and apologized but nobody was angry at her, why should they? She was just earning money.

“But fortunately I only have to do this four times a month because of how many work I’m able to do in a few hours. I gain a lots of benefits in terms of payment for my perfect and high amount of merit.” She explained with a small victory sign.

With that done, the week went on as the other days before except the morning of the last day of the week. Maika was silently reading the newspapers and at one point she put down her mug and made a big announcement:  
“I found a target!”

Excited they wanted to hear who it was. Maika showed them a page in the newspaper that showed:  
Signor Denaro, owner of the successful company, the Denaro Group acquired the valuable item, Prism Falcon and is going to showcase it in two days on a big party in his main residence in the South Blue.”

“From this article alone you can see everything you need. Signor Denaro is a corrupt CEO and one of my favorite targets. Yup, Kagami already payed him some visits. He is an arrogant jerk, it’s fun humiliating him.” The stingray explained and continued with an evil smile.  
“In addition, according to this article he just gained the Prism Falcon. Imagine how painful this is going to be for him when I’m taking it away from him during this big party! I can’t wait to see his stupid face, ngahahaha!  
The way she laughed was full of schadenfreude for future events.

This was the kind of attitude Arlong really loved on her and he was actually really looking forward to see Kagami in action again.  
Maika who was behind her calm appearance really excited explained how things will go: “Today will go as normal with our training, tomorrow, we’ll do a shorter session so we can prepare for the heist. At the end of that day I’ll sent the advance notice with my wind powers to Denaro so it’ll arrive on the morning of the day of the heist. And on that important day we’ll travel to his residence, that will take us a few hours and at the time of the party, where he wants to showcase his precious new treasure...we strike and steal it right in front of his nose and everyone will see it!”

The three fishmen liked the idea and were now heated up for the day of the heist as well, however their mood was crushes with Maika bluntly telling them how she was planning on bombarding them with Air Blasts in today’s training session.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was a bit exhausing to write because of the many topics in there but I'm satisfied with the result. Next chapter we have Kagami again and Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew will come with her.


	8. Thieves at the Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first time Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew join Kagami on a regular heist for a treasure.

Advance Notice

Tonight under the shining moon, I’m coming for the Prism Falcon to steal it from Signor Denaro with skill and grace.

Phantom Thief Kagami

“And this when I just received it. Kagami is such a dirty vixen...Is vixen even the right word? I mean she is a ray...whatever!”  
Was what Signor Denaro responded when he read Kagami’s advance notice, that arrived on his huge estate. His mansion was so huge and pompous, it let Maika’s mansion look like an old shack.

The owner of this giant estate sat in his fancy office, preparing everything for his big party, where he was going to present, what Kagami was after. He was a rather small middle-aged, tan-skinned human man in a dark green suit and jangling gems around his chubby body and his short black hair was neatly gelled. However, by all means he still looked very boorish.

His looks may be ridiculous but he was one of the most rich and influential people in the world, who wasn’t a noble, marine or pirate. His company was so successful, that it had tight links to the world government, who let him continue to be so successful. His ties even allowed him to own seastone, what he used against devil fruit users just as Kagami, his number one enemy.

Denaro threw the advance notice into a trash can and laughed loudly in arrogance:  
“This dirty fishwoman is such an annoyance to me for five years now. I suffered bitter defeats in the past but I learned and with the latest security I arranged and my supply on seastone I’ll catch this logia this time and present her to everyone next to the treasure she is after, hahahaha!”

Later in the afternoon on Maika’s island, the crew of fishmen was preparing themselves for the departure, since Maika told them, that the advance notice she sent out last night arrived.  
“How does this whole notice sending actually work Maika-san? You don’t use some kind of service so how are you doing that, chuu? Chew asked curious and Maika was ready to answer that.

“As Kagami, I sent the notice by letting it fly right in front of their doors. I know it’s kilometers afar but I can sense and manipulate all of the wind currencies and when wind blows against something, I’m able to feel what it is according to shape, height, mass etc. That making my delivery very accurate. Oh, and by the way if there would every be any wind in the Calm Belt, that’s me sending a notice or flying over it. I can create wind at any time as Kagami after all.”

That was another trait of a well trained and experienced logia, total understanding of the element they are controlling. And since wind or in other words air is almost everywhere, she can sense and manipulate it even from very far away.

“Now that that is out of the way...” The stingray said with reaching to her inner pocket of her jacket. “Shall we?” She put out her mask, signalizing that it was time to go.  
“Of course Maika-chan time to steal this treasure!” Arlong cheered in optimism.

They went outside and Maika put immediately her mask on, that covering her in this green flame-like light and turning her into Phantom Thief Kagami.

“Ngahahahaha! Finally it’s time for some action again! I, Kagami will make a beautiful show once more and this time with three neat companions on my side!” The phantom thief made a dramatic pose while saying this.

“Only we three are here to hear you Kagami-san...” The three fishmen tried to say her.  
“Who cares! I still sound cool and I’m feeling the spirit!”  
A harsh reminder that as Kagami she had a different personality than as Maika.

After that, Arlong had a quick realization at something legitimate:  
“Wait a sec! You have no ship...and you can’t expect us to swim to the South Blue especially because you cannot swim!”

As answer Kagami suddenly started laughing loudly with her hands on her hips: “Ngahahahaha! Ngahahaha! Cute, Arlong-kun, very cute but also foolish to assume that. Of course we are flying!”

With that said, she spread out her arms and hovered up in the air like a magician, surrounded by a strong wind. Not soon after, Arlong and the others were surrounded by the same wind and hovered up as well.

“We’ll now travel through the sky, mentally prepare yourself for this. Wind Traveling always feels weird for the first time, believe me, I’m talking from experience.”

She waited for them to confirm that they were ready and so she started to fly with them high up into the sky. High, high up so they were able to look at the ocean as one giant blue carpet.  
“This feels weird and almost frightening!” Kuroobi stated.  
“It’s like free falling but also staying in place!” Chew said in addition.  
“Told you it’s weird at the beginning but you’ll get used to it soon.” Kagami explained calmly. “How about you Arlong-kun? How do you feel?”

At first, she didn’t get an answer, Arlong was way too amazed by what was happening in the moment. It sure felt weird but the view was astonishing and he felt so unreachable so high up in the sky. He reached a complete new level, a level no fishman had ever reached before. Never so over the surface, never so close to the sun…

His answer, when he was back with his mind was a simple: “I think it’s very cool.”  
“I’m glad to hear that, Arlong-kun. Time for you to experience Wind Traveling at its best!”

And so they began to fly through the sky with an amazing tempo, faster than any ship could ever fly. The adrenaline rushed through Arlong’s blood, the sensation of traveling in the sky overwhelmed him. He took full pleasure out of this activity and was amazed that Kagami did this on a regular base.

“With that speed, we will be there in around four hours, just in time for the party!” Kagami explained. “And are you enjoying my method of traveling the world now?”  
“Sure do! It’s great!” She get as answer from all three, which letting her have a pleased smile.

The four hours passed and they finally arrived Signor Denaro’s estate. From above they found out, that the party hasn’t started yet but everything was already prepared. Most of the staff was on the courtyard, where the party should be hold. Through her experience and knowledge about this place she knew exactly, that all of the security guards were inside the mansion to protect Denaro and his treasures.

The next step was to land behind the bushes near the back entrance to hide, they were really big, it was no problem for four fishmen to hide there. Because Kagami had now company with her, she needed to use other infiltration methods but she already knew what to do.  
She turned into her logia form and flew to one of the staff members, who had a house key, in that case the janitor, who was checking on the lanterns.

The phantom thief sneaked behind the janitor, turned only her hand tangible again to grab the keys, turned it intangible again and floated with the keys back into the bushes. The janitor asked himself if it was more windy this day.  
Back in her normal form, she and the others sneaked to the door and just opened it with the keys.

“Great, that went very fluent how you stole the keys.” Kuroobi praised the phantom thief, who laughed amused: “Ngaha, it’s nothing special. Stealing the keys and just entering every room is a very standard method of operation. But now that we’re in, it’s time for the next strategy we discussed, or better I came up with everything and you just vibe with it.”

The next step was to avoid all of the Camera Den Den Mushi all around the corridors. The plan was to use the pressure of weak Air Blasts that distract all hit Den Den Mushi for a couple of seconds. With that they were able to run through a few corridors without getting caught until they arrived one with three guards patrolling there.

They have discussed a strategy as well for that case, a method how her companions can do something as well.

First Kagami showed herself in front of the guards with: “Hey, gentlemen you are hired to catch me, so here I am!”  
When the guards rushed to her, she fired Air Blasts to the Den Den Mushis, that distracting the guards. In that moment her companions came out of their hideout, rushed to the guards and knocked all three of them out without any problems. With the guards being unconscious, they ran down the corridors as long the Den Den Mushi were still confused.

“Hey, I’m proud of you that you followed my orders to just know them out and not killing them.” Kagami mentioned impressed.  
“You threatened us to beat us to pancakes if we would do that Kagami-san...” Kuroobi mentioned annoyed.  
“And you had that devilish smile while threatening us, chuu...”

Arlong’s answer was: “Well I didn’t kill him but to hit him unconscious, I punched him in the stomach. So he lost consciousness though to pain, shahahaha!”  
As respond Kagami rolled her eyes with an irritated: “Urgh, think I let that slip...” But was still smiling.

Continuing their tactic of Air Blast, knocking out guards, progressing was very effective and after a short while they arrived the room, where Denaro usually kept his most valuable treasures.  
Kagami opened it with the stolen key and they entered it.

The first act was, avoiding the Den Den Mushi, on the entrance with the usual method. After this was done, they were able to walk in casually.

As to expect of the treasure room of a multi-billionaire, it was huge, more than fancy with bright blue walls, huge pillars and full of different kinds of valuable treasure.  
“Ngahaha, now let the show begin! Just wait for me my sweet treasure.” Kagami cheered while adjusting her tuxedo with a smug smirk.

Her companions were fascinated by all the valuable things that were in this room and Chew came up with a suggestion: “Kagami-san, how about we take...a little bit more than announced...chuu?”

“Denied!” Was her blunt answer and Chew wanted to know why.  
“Two reasons. First, I only steal what is named on the advance notice and I’ll never break this rule, you know how loyal I am towards my profession. And second I just can’t be so greedy and steal everything because if I do that, I cannot return here anytime if there is nothing to steal from my favorite target!”  
The three fishmen slapped their palms against their foreheads and sighed but somehow got the logic…

Suddenly Kagami stopped walking and looked around focused. Arlong asked what she was doing and Kuroobi’s assumption was: “Like I’d expect, she’s carefully examining her surroundings.”

“T, this is...” Kagami snapped. “Woo-hoo! This room is full of traps! This is gonna be fun!” She suddenly started to cheer in total excitement.  
Kuroobi and Chew let out an exhausted sigh and Arlong, who didn’t expect anything else from the thrill seeking Kagami, chuckled in amusement.

The phantom thief jumped in the air, did a flip just to show off and landed a few meters away.  
“Why did you do that?” Chew asked confused.  
“Because under this part of the floor is a trapdoor, that opens itself when stepped on, followed by the triggered alarm. And as I know Denaro, he probably placed something like spikes down there so I highly recommend you to not step on it.”

Without any more explanation, they listened to her and jumped over there as well to avoid the trapdoor, even if it made more noise when they landed on the floor than Kagami did with them being taller and far less slender.

Soon they arrived the pedestal where the Prism Falcon was placed under a glass cabinet.  
“Here guys, is the treasure we are after.” She explained while pointing at the falcon-shaped stature out of clear prism, that shined in a pale but beautiful shade of cyan because of the wall colors.

“Neat! What are you waiting for? Let’s take it!” The sawshark said while reaching for it but Kagami stopped him.

“Wait, Arlong-kun don’t be foolish! I just mentioned that this room is full of traps so taking it out of the cabinet won’t be so easy. I took a closer look at it and found out something interesting. It’s likely that there’s a bomb set underneath the Prism Falcon. If anyone other than Denaro touches the case...Kaboom!” She gestured an explosion. “Like that. Geez, what a mean-spirited rich guy. His methods to get rid of me get more and more cruel and ruthless...”

“That’s bad. And how are we going to take it from here?” Kuroobi asked distressed.  
“Hmmm...” The stingray thought for a second. “It’s impossible.” She stated looking somewhere else, bored.

Arlong asked angry what else to do and couldn’t believe that Kagami would give up so easily.  
He would like to just crack up that damn cabinet but that would just trigger that cursed bomb. Painfully he realized that neither violence or money were the solution to this problem. This time were intelligence and planning needed.

“Don’t worry Arlong-kun.” The thief calmed him down while tapping him on the back.  
“It’s impossible for the average thief, which I am surely not. Currently it’s impossible to take it out of the cabinet but it’s not impossible to steal it. I have a plan and for this I’m going to use the things that are here to stop me.” Kagami explained with a confident grin and wink.  
Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew didn’t get the whole picture but trusted her.

Her next action was to step on a certain spot at the floor and when she did that, the spot sunk in a bit. That causing lasers to fire from a painting on the wall. Of course the lasers just went through her but it activated the alarm. Kagami ordered to stay where they were and just to relax.  
“Don’t worry, I have everything under control.”

In his office, Denaro noticed the alarm from the treasure room and through a Den Den Mushi he ordered all guards to rush in there and to catch the intruder.  
In just a matter of a few moments the guards stormed into the treasure room where the fishmen already waited for them.

One guard yelled: “You and your assistants are under arrest Phantom Thief Kagami!”  
“We aren’t her assistants! We are her companions stupid human!” Arlong complained angered.  
Kagami snickered amused and told the guard: “You know, you’re security guards and no marines but who cares nobody can arrest me!”

She then began to fly to the ceiling and the guards threw chains made of seastone from launchers at her. Becoming intangible would be useless so she dodged around four attacks until the fifth suddenly hit her. The chains wrapped around her and the thief fell on the ground unable to move.

Her companions shouted her name in shock and were soon chained down themselves as well.  
When all four were caught the guards managed to bring them all into a cage, still chained down and waited for what happened next. The guards gave report about the caught thieves and soon after that Signor Denaro entered the treasure room to take a view of the situation for himself.

He saw the caught fishmen in the cage and a large vicious smile grew on his ugly face.  
“Hohohoho, well look at that, what do we have here? A little rat.”  
“Ngahahaha well look at that, what do we have here? A deformed hamster.” Kagami mocked him back. “I’m a ray, you should already know that after five years Signor.”

Her usual lack of respect infuriated the rich man but he managed to keep his slimy grin:  
“Rude as always but now here you are in my cage Ms. Burglar Ray.”  
“I’m not a burglar, I’m a phantom thief, you should’ve known that as well!”  
“Silence Kagami!” He yelled at her in great anger and Kagami just grinned. “You’re not in the position to make fun of me!” 

After a few deep breaths he calmed down and asked her something:  
“Who are these guys?”  
“Oh, they? They are my new companions, I met them not long ago. I thought it would be nice to have some company during heists. Plus it’s a neat handicap to make things more interesting.”  
“Don’t call us a handicap!” All three of them snapped irritated.

Denaro took a closer look at them and came to a conclusion: “Three and not long ago...are they the three individuals you freed from Impel Down?!”  
“Bingo!” Kagami confirmed.  
“Hohohoho!” Denaro started laughing again. “Who would have thought that I managed something what the staff from Impel Down and everyone else didn’t! I’m even more amazing than I thought, I caught the so called unstoppable phantom thief Wildcard Kagami!”

“Yeah, yeah, congratulations.” Kagami responded sarcastic. “Soooo what are you planning to do with us now that I am unable to flee?”  
The lord of this estate clapped his hands and answered amused: “That’s easy to answer my hateful Kagami. I’m going to present you to all of my guests on the party to demonstrate my wonderful achievement. After the party, I’ll call the Marine to take you in and I get your bounty, which lately raised to 380 million berry am I right? What I do with these delinquents? Hmmm, I guess I sell them as slaves to my guests…”

After he said the last sentence, the four fishmen’s faces had very dark scowls and looked at him full of hatred. “Humans...especially those rich humans...they are all the same…disgusting!” Went through Arlong’s enraged mind. But more surprising was that even the always happy-go lucky Kagami looked truly mad and gave him after Arlong, the most hateful glare.

“You little disgusting pig...you’ll get this back.” She hissed at him.  
At first Denaro was scared and intimidated by her glare but after he managed to get himself together again, he laughed at her: “Hohoho, you’re threatening me?! In your situation?! Hilarious! But I’m glad that there really is something that lets you lose your cool. You guys are quite sensitive over the topic of slavery? No wonder when thinking about the history of you fishmen. However your species doesn’t have any other purpose than being used by the worthy humans. I mean, you’re strong but ugly, disgusting and uncultured beasts.”

His intentions was to mock them but he didn’t expect that Arlong would spat at him with leading to Denaro whining about his suit and that he need to change. Arlong had a little comment left:  
“Ohhh, the big and mighty human whines like a little child cause someone treats him with the disrespect he deserves. All pride no skill, like all snobby humans. I would call you a deformed hamster or a pig like Kagami did, but that would insult hamsters and pigs. You have money and money is fine and well but without that, you’re nothing! Nothing more that a small, ugly, pathetic, weak piece of human scum!” Suddenly the sawshark began to chuckle in a malicious way: “Shahahah, imagine I wouldn’t be trapped in here. What so you think I would do to you then, hm?”

Once more ran the cold sweat down Denaro’s spine, in reality being completely scared of him and he turned around to head up to the door to hide his fear. He coughed before he said his final words of the conversations: “Anyway, I have a party to host. I’m looking forward to present you fish scum, ta-ta.”

Denaro left the room and the trapped fishmen were brought into a different place, that looked like a huge lumber room. A blanked was placed over the cage and they were left alone.

After they confirmed to be the only people in the room Arlong sighed deep and asked annoyed: “And I’m really not allowed to brutally murder that peace of shit Kagami? Come on this trash is just a waste of space and air, you saw how he talked about our people!”  
“Nope, I can totally understand your reasons but we don’t kill. We are going to humiliate him in front of everyone when we get out of here.” The stingray explained.

Soon all four of them started to laugh quietly and Kuroobi said amused: “Getting caught on purpose to wait for the perfect opportunity to steal the Prism Falcon was a great idea Kagami-san.”

Chew added with a smirk: “For trying to catch you for so long now, they should have actually known that such simple measures would never be able to catch you. We three would’ve been able to dodge them effortless as well, chuu.”  
“Shahaha, good that they are so stupid.”

Kagami began to use her usual tail trick to open up the locks and in less then a minute she was free. She also opened the locks of her companions but they let the chains on just like they planned it.

“Alright, time to get to the business. You guys stay here, acting like you’re still caught, wait for the signal and I take care of the rest. No need for any worry, as I like to say: I have everything under control.” She gave thumps up and they nodded in optimism.  
Because the cage’s bars were made out of normal metal, she just went through them without fully transforming into her logia form and avoiding the bars. But right after the stepped out of the cage she turned into air and escaped through the door’s keyhole.

In her pure air state she was totally invisible and so she could wander around the entire mansion with nobody noticing her. This went for quite a while until she saw what she was waiting for, a butler being at a lonely place. Quickly she materialized again and knocked him unconscious with a karate chop. After that was done, she took her mask off, becoming Maika again just to steal the butler’s clothes. After she hid the unconscious butler in a closet, she sneaked herself under the people.

The suit was very tight on her since it was too small but that was the primary reason she took a butler and no maid. If a suit barely suits would a maid outfit never fit. The long sleeves covered her ray wings and she wrapped her tail around the waist and hid it under the shirt.  
Maika went in the kitchen, where she got the information that the party just started and was ordered to serve some food on a plate to the guests.

The place where the party occurred was the broad courtyard stretched across the front of the grand mansion. In the center, a pond with a lit-up fountain spurted water. Placed around the pond were gourmet dishes from all over the world, and close by acrobats displayed their remarkable skill with balls and knives. The courtyard was filled with wealthy people invited from multiple countries: both gentlemen in well-tailored suits and fine ladies in sparkling dresses graced the party.

Many of the guests were former targets of Kagami and Maika decided for a little eavesdropping on their conversations, that was what her disguise plan was for in the first place.

During her role as butler, she saw new faces, who talked about their new received riches. Maika would remembered these as potential targets.

It wasn’t long until she witnessed two individuals, she knew too well: the slimy arts collector Leopold van Bauhaben and the beauty and class obsessed fashion designer Ulivida Beatrice. 

Both were equally despicable people as Denaro and so very favorable targets for heists.  
Bauhaben was an older bespectacled slender man with short brown curls and a gaudy golden scarf draped over his white suit. Ulivida was a young woman with glass-pale skin wearing a fuchsia revealing dress, lots of make-up and her bright-blonde hair was pinned-up. The two wealthy people stood side-by-side with champagne glasses in hand, discussing.

“Sheesh, it’s so vexing! Calling me to a party as ostentatious as this just to gloat! Signor Denaro is indeed an utterly boorish man.” Bauhaben hissed in strong annoyance. “I hope, he organized something interesting to prove it not to be a total waste of my time. I’m preparing myself for an auction where some pretty paintings and sculptures I got an eye on will be auctioned. On the last one I bought a painting of Enies Lobby.”

He loved hearing himself talking way too much. Maika and Ulivida, who couldn’t be more different, were equally pissed off by his constant babbling and both quietly sighed. To make him stop talking for at least a second, Maika interrupted him and offered both of them snacks.

“Would you like to have some dear Sir and Madam?”  
After they took some, Maika bowed politely and wanted to go away but Ulivida had some last words to say in her bitchy voice: “Denaro is tasteless as always, letting female staff wear suits that are even too small. The worst part is he allows them to have tattoos over their eyes.”  
“These are birthmarks... bitch...” Maika mumbled annoyed and distanced herself for good.

She eavesdropped on the guests for quite a while until the lights turned off and the spotlight went to the big stage. Behind the curtains the party-host Denaro appeared laughing with a microphone in his hand.

“Welcome, welcome Ladies and Gentleman, do you enjoy the party? Of course you do. I invited you, my fellow celebrities, to present you my new treasure in full grace: The Prism Falcon!”

Staff members shove the cabin with the aforementioned Prism Falcon, the spotlight illuminating all of its beauty and everyone stared impressed at this sculpture. Denaro took out of the cabinet, which was brought away and proved once more, that it was all his.

“But my dear fellows, that wasn’t everything yet!” The party-host announced prideful.  
“I archived something big! You know, I received an advance notice from Phantom Thief Kagami we all hate so much. She is after my Prism Falcon but here it comes: I caught her!”

The audience started to discuss loudly in disbelief that he caught a thief no one every was close on catching. He laughed loud into the microphone to celebrate himself even more.  
“After the party, I’ll call the Marine to arrest her but there is something in addition!” Denaro explained further. “She brought some assistants with her this time, who were caught as well and I’m selling those three assistants as slaves right here! They are very muscular fishmen so they are able to manage hard physical work!”

His guests were very delighted about the offer and couldn’t wait for the spontaneous slave auction.  
Denaro ordered the cage to be brought to him on stage. As this was done, he grabbed the blanket, that covered the cage and pulled it off with the words: “I present you a chained down Kagami!”

However, when everyone was able to look at the cage, Kagami was missing and Arlong, Kuroobi and Chew just grinned victoriously.  
“Wh-wh-what!? Why!? Where is Kagami?!” Denaro stammered with his face turning pale and sweaty.  
“Oh, me? I’m just hanging around here, enjoying the party.” 

A powerful female voice resonated thought the entire courtyard. Everyone looked at the direction the voice came from, that was the rearmost side of the courtyard. The spotlights were directed to it as well and at this place stood Kagami, casually with one hand placed on her hip, wearing a smug smile.

The reaction of the crowd was loud gasping and whispering but when she started to slowly walk relaxed over the red carpet, everyone was silent. Nobody dared to say anything. They were all shocked and even intimidated by how confident she came closer to the stage. Even her companions were astonished by this and through Kuroobi’s mind went: “Amazing...all eyes are on her and nobody says anything, they are just watching her perform...what a charismatic aura...”

The silence was broken by Denaro, who infuriated yelled at her: “I have no clue how in the world you managed to escape the seastone chains but how dare you to steal my spotlight!”  
Kagami had to chuckle amused when she responded: “A great magician never explains their tricks to their audience. And a phantom thief always steals the spotlight besides treasure, it’s part of the job. In addition that’s not a hard task to archive, since I am way more interesting than you, ngaha.”

“Silence, fish burglar!” The enraged host put out a golden gun and tried to shoot the stingray, however in his rage, he forgot normal attacks were absolutely useless against her.  
The bullet just went through her and she vanished but not soon after a small tornado formed on a big table and Kagami materialized out of it, laughing.

The phantom thief did a little bow, placed a hand on her chest and started her speech:  
“Ladies and Gentleman! It’s time that I, Phantom Thief Kagami will make a great show while taking the Prism Falcon!” She pointed at Denaro with the aforementioned treasure in his hands.

Denaro’s eye twitched in fury and he aimed with his gun at the cage, threatening to shoot one of them, if she move one more inch. In response Kagami’s smug grin didn’t vanish and she told him, that he wouldn’t manage to do that.

He was challenged by her and when he pulled the trigger, the bullet was blocked by Kuroobi’s ray wing. All three released themselves from the chains and broke out of the cage with ease.  
“No, not you, too!” Denaro cursed in panic. “What the heck is going on!?”

“Shahahahaha! That’s simple to explain you stupid human! Everything just goes according to plan!”  
Arlong explained mockingly and the next move was that Kuroobi used his hair to take the treasure from Denaro and passed it to Kagami.

After Kagami laughed victorious, Denaro collected himself again and ordered to catch the thieves and to return his treasure. Suddenly a bunch of knives flew in Kagami’s direction and went through her. They almost hit her companions but they dodged by jumping of the stage. Denaro was almost hit as well and he yelled to watch out better.

Kagami turned around and found out, who threw the knives and was not really surprised, that it were the acrobat troupe of four. The leader of them, a muscular tan-skinned man with dark-blonde wild hair in an orange acrobats costume. He explained that his crew was actually a crew of bounty hunters called the Trapezoid Troupe and the leader was named Tokkan.

“An acrobat-themed bounty hunter crew, huh? Sounds interesting, I wanna see what you guys have to offer and if you have at least a teeny-tiny chance of challenging me.” Kagami stated in her usual arrogance, playing with the treasure in her hands.

Tokkan felt provoked by her and wanted to fight her all by himself and his three crew members should take care of the other three fishman, that amusing Kagami.  
“Ngahaha, hey guys, that’s the perfect opportunity to test your progress you made in the past week! And don’t forget I’ll kick you out, if you kill someone!”  
“Fine Kagami, beating-up is okay, too! You don’t have to constantly threat us!”

Tokkan opened the fight with attacking Kagami with a knife but the stabbing didn’t affect her at all with her grinning mockingly. “Tss...” He hissed. “The rumors are true and everything I just saw of you. You really are a logia. Seems like I need to take different measures.”

The acrobat took his knife back and tried to stab again but this time Kagami somehow had the desire to dodge, so she did by leaning to the side. But it wasn’t over with that, Tokkan attacked again several times until the stingray had enough and flew up to the ceiling.

Up there she saw that the party guests hid themselves in the corners to be unaffected by the fight but most importantly was that Tokkan’s knife was black now, leading to a simple conclusion Kagami’s:  
“That’s why I was suddenly so alarmed! Armament haki, the only thing besides seastone able to hurt me!”

She didn’t say anything but the scowl in her face told everything. “Ha, looks like you’re feeling cornered now Kagami, huh?!” But her reaction to this was different than he expected. Her scowl quickly turned into a provoking grin. “Ngaha, that makes things even more interesting. Come on Mr. Tokkan, do your worst and let me find out how much of my power I am forced to use to defeat you!”

In reality, the only thing Kagami’s team had to do was just to fly away, since they already had the treasure, but where would be the fun? The excitement of facing opponents, who try to stop her was the thrill she was looking for. Usually she avoided unnecessary battles but this was the Trapezoid Troupe, a crew of acrobat bounty hunters, that though to her massive ego motivated her to prove herself as better.

“You know no respect, but I’ll smash it in you!” Tokkan shouted at her and used his acrobatic skills to attack her from different sides even if she was in the air.   
However she dodged effortless until Tokkan threw more knives this time with armament haki. For this she used her Air Cutter attack, which blocked the knives and Kagami let the remaining blades disappear before they could hit Tokkan.

“You took your attack back to not hurt your enemy?! I could have dodged that!” He complained, feeling humiliated by her act.  
“Sorry but my attack’s target were the knives and not you.” Kagami falsely apologized. “By the way, I know that you would have been able to dodge that but making you feel embarrassed is funnier. You know what? This isn’t a fair fight, I come down and I won’t turn into air so you don’t have to use your quite weak armament haki so much.”

It was more that obvious, that she was just playing with him and that drove Tokkan mad.

Meanwhile the other acrobats fought the other fishman. They had a similar style of attacking with the knives but were way weaker. Kuroobi, could take his opponent out with a few karate moves while crushing the stage. 

Chew took some water from the fountain to block the knives, flying in his direction. Then he opened the fire himself and fired the waterballs at his opponent, he dodged with his acrobatic skills but that was intended by Chew. The acrobat jumped behind Chew to attack him with one of his blades but the smelt-whiting fishman saw that coming, quickly turned around and smashed his fist against his opponents stomach so much, he lost consciousness.

And Arlong at first was only dodging his enemy’s attacks and remembered everything Maika taught them in the past week. Like observing your enemy, analyzing their tactics and where their strengths and weaknesses were. According to his own observation, he was way stronger than these acrobats, especially because he saw how easily his friends won and he was the strongest of the trio. 

He remembered one other thing Maika taught them: If you know by certain, that you are the stronger one and the stakes aren’t high, you can play with your enemy and this was what he did the entire time.

The acrobat complained how a such big guy like Arlong was so hard to hid. It was a good thing, that Maika focused by his training on speed and tactic. “Why are you just dodging?!”  
“Shaha, because I am now ready to attack!”

Arlong rammed his fist in the ground with great force, creating a small crater in it. As he expected, the acrobat jumped far away from him, that opening the next step of his little experiment. The sawshark took on a position as if he was ready to jump right after his target.

“Shark on Darts!”

Like a torpedo, he launched himself after his target, what was able to dodge in the last second though to the distance they had and Arlong crashed in one of the mansion’s walls.  
“My precious mansion!” Denaro whined when he saw the huge hole in the wall.

Arlong continued with his Shark on Darts attack for quite a while, setting his enemy under great pressure and making holes in walls. After a few times, he was actually able to predict where the acrobat was going to jump. Learning to predict your opponents moves was something Maika very valued during their training. Arlong reached the point where he wanted to see if his plan worked in the end, so he used Shark on Darts for one last time and the acrobat jumped to the left in the air, just like he predicted.

Before crashing in another wall, he placed his feet on the ground again and jumped after the acrobat in shortest time. But his intention wasn’t to stab him with his rostrum. Arlong was now slightly above him, grabbed the acrobat at his back with his big hand and rammed him from above into the ground. 

The sound of the impact was loud and a cloud of dust covered the crater. But after it disappeared ,everyone could see the defeated acrobat lying in the crater and Arlong stepping out of it with a wide sharp-teethed grin. He laughed loudly in victory: “Shahahaha! Don’t worry humans, he isn’t dead!”

The way this went was completely different than his usual fights. Arlong was no genius, especially not on Kagami’s level but he was still very intelligent and it felt so good using this intelligence in combat. Predicting what is going to happen, planning something and seeing how it comes out in the end, combining tactic with his usual rough fighting style...it was something he really could get used to.

He turned to Kagami and told her: “Eyy, Kagami we are all done here! I think it’s time to finish this!” The phantom thief heard this and gave thumps up.

During the entire time, she was just plain messing around with Tokkan. Just blocking all of his attacks with a smug expression and this with only one hand because with the other she was still holding the Prism Falcon.

The thief and the acrobat leader stopped for a moment and Kagami looked at Tokkan’s face, summarizing: “Uuuuh, you look really exhausted so sweaty and breathy you are. Hmm, I guess I shouldn’t have messed around with you so much, even if it was fun, sorry. As apology I’m going to finish it quickly.”

“Wh-what?” Tokkan asked huffing but that was everything he could say until Kagami placed her hand on his stomach and whispered: “Show’s over...Air Blast.”

The pressure of the attack spread through his entire body and he lost consciousness immediately but his body was catapulted a few meters and crashed in a few tables with dishes. The dishes flew from the table and would have hit a few guests, leading to Bauhaben using Ulivida as shield.

“You old bastard!” The woman cursed in rage. “My entire appearance is ruined! My precious beauty...curse you Kagami!”  
“Hey, I think you look way better now, ngahaha!” The stingray gave back chuckling.

Now that the fight was won, her companions came to her, that signalizing, they were ready to leave. Kagami hold the treasure up and shouted out passionate: “I hope you enjoyed the show everyone! Just as promised, I stole the Prism Falcon from Signor Denaro with skill and grace! And this time with my wonderful companions on my side, who made a great figure as well!”

After that all four were covered in wind and flew away. Kagami said goodbye with the words: “Let’s see each other again under the next shining moon!”  
With that, the four fishmen disappeared in the night sky.

A few moments passed til Denaro managed to get himself together again. The host didn’t realize yet that his entire body was covered in the dirt from the battle. He shook his head a few times, his face was something between defeat and anger. He started talking to himself: “Defeated and tricked again...dammit! Everything, literally everything went, too good for them, way too good! Don’t tell me, please don’t tell this was planned! Please don’t tell me, she and her assistants let themselves get caught on purpose!”

Soon the realization and humility of defeat hit him like one of Admiral Fujitora’s meteors and he began to brag around like a little brat, yelling the same thing, he yelled everytime when losing to Kagami: “Gaaahhh! Damn you Kagami! You are going to pay for this!”

At the same time the four fishman celebrated their victory:  
“Yaaay! Another glorious win for the one and only Kagami, ngahaha!” The stingray cheered in joy.  
“And how did you like it guys?”

“It was awesome! I can really imagine doing stuff like this on a regular base!” Arlong told her excited and so did Kuroobi and Chew.

“I’m really glad to hear that, this is going to be fun.” Kagami had a warm smile while saying this. But suddenly she took out five advance notices out or her tuxedo.  
“Then we can spend the next days on these here!” Her smile went to a wide sharp-teethed grin.

“Wait what?!” Her companions asked overwhelmed and Kagami explained the issue.  
“When I was playing butler, I eavesdropped on the party guests, who are equally scumbags as Denaro and talked about their recently received treasures and so we are going after these next! How about we start tomorrow?”  
“Hey, hey wait a sec!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, already chapter 8, nice. It's refreshing writing Kagami again after 5 chapters and how Arlong becomes in fond of tactical combat.


	9. Thief of the Holy Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Christmas-themed chapter. Maika tells a story from her times as a phantom thief rookie with an unexpected power

It was the afternoon before Christmas Eve and Maika was surprised by the visit of a certain octopus fishman.

“Hachi-kun...” Maika began, her face and voice showing how overwhelmed and flustered she was with her situation. “I really appreciate your efforts and your will of kindness in this act but I think this is way too much!”

The cause of this statement was that Hachi suddenly appeared in front of her house with lots of, lots of Christmas decoration and she as well as her housemates couldn’t believe what they saw.

Arlong asked perplex, while pointing at the cartons: “Hachi-nii, why? And why so much?”  
“While Lady Maika and I telephoned once, we came to the topic of the coming Christmas and she mentioned, that she has no decoration or no reason to celebrates at all!. I was so shocked, when I heard that, nyuu, especially with such a big house she has! And so I decided to buy her enough decoration for her estate, even if it really scratched on my budget.” The octopus fishman explained in a very passionate way.

The overwhelmed stingray sighed deeply, grabbed herself in her gray hair before reaching into her pocket and pulling out her wallet. “How many did this cost Hachi-kun?” She asked sternly.  
“Why? Do you want to return the money I spent on the decoration?”  
“Exactly, I feel bad for this, especially because I never expected from you to do this at all. Like I said, I appreciate your kindness but I’ll return you the money. Now tell me the price.”  
“But Lady Maika...it’s fine really...”  
“Shut up and take my money!” The tone in Maika’s voice was so demanding, that Hachi didn’t even had the courage to reject the offer one more time.

After she gave him the exact same sum he payed, Maika took a look on the cartons once more and came to a decision: “Uff, fine. Now that these things are here, I don’t see a reason to not use them, especially when it’s a sweet present from Hachi-kun...” She turned to the others with a small but warm smile: “Well, then help me to bring this old shack into a neat Christmas mood.” It almost sounded like an order but they didn’t mind that much, since they were used to Maika’s constant demanding undertone.

A little while passed after the outside was neatly but modesty decorated and the group focused on the way more complicated inside of the mansion. When Maika was taking care of building up the 2.50 meters high plastic Christmas tree, Arlong brought her the carton full of Christmas balls and other stuff. Right after she thanked him, curiosity overcame the sawshark and he asked her a question with false innocence: “Yo, Maika-chan, is it true, that you really have no reason to celebrate Christmas at all? If, yes, what triggered your change of mind?”

Maika just finished building up the tree and gave him a total casual, almost not interested answer while adjusting the plastic needles: “My reason for having no reason is the fact that I was literally completely alone for 15 whole years. Celebrating alone is really pathetic and because I’m way to prideful to call myself pathetic, I decided to just ignore the holidays at all. Even if I celebrated with my parents earlier, we only did that because of the pure tradition and our image as the perfect rich and successful family and not because we wanted to. I got neat presents, we decorated nicely and the dishes were astonishing but the so-called Christmas Spirit never reached us.”

Arlong and Kuroobi, Chew and Hachi, who overheard the conversation mumbled in sync: “That’s just sad and depressing...”

Maika of course heard that and hissed in great annoyance: “Hey, at least I try this year, now with some people, whose presence I don’t view as a throw-up material! Everything is better than these people, who cursed themselves my parents! And now we leave that topic! I at least try to celebrate Christmas this year and I do my best, so don’t get on my bad side!”  
That was the second time Hachi experienced the fishwoman being so grumpy and it was about the same topic as last time: Her family.

Arlong observed this sore spot of Maika for a while now. She always got really angry when talked about it and demanded an immediate topic switch. The stingray just mentioned how horrible her relationship with her parents was but never went into further details. He deeply asked himself how unbelievable horrible her relationship with her parents was.

However, even if Arlong was really eager to know more about Maika, he decided to leave it be for the holidays. He didn’t want to piss her off more than she already was. Both had a really, really short temper except that they lived out their short temper in different ways. When Arlong was mad, he usually went on a rampage with destroying everything that comes in front of his eyes, excluding nakama. 

With Maika it was a different deal, she had a death glare and such an imperious aura, that made it next to impossible withstanding her. That mostly laid in her genes, since her mother Aegis was exactly like that and not only when she was upset. She wasn’t called “The most terrifying woman on Fishman Island” with no reason. Everyone was really glad, that nobody ever saw Maika truly outrageous, especially with these incredible powers of hers.

However, when Arlong managed to banish this train of thoughts he turned to his left and realized in the time he was stuck with daydreaming, Maika went into the cellar and came out again with a 70 cm tiny golden Christmas tree in her hands. When she placed it on the lobby desk, it drove the attention of the other to them and Chew asked: “According to all that fancy jewelry as accessory on it, I guess it’s pretty valuable. In which store for super rich people did you bought that, chuu?”

The fishwoman answered Chew while finding the perfect angle to place the golden tree:  
“I didn’t bought it, I stole it. It’s the only Christmas decoration, I’ve owned before. It’s one of the few treasures, I would not massacre you for touching it, since it’s everything but fragile. I mean it survived a fall from a cliff.” The guys asked themselves what kind of story was behind that.

“Anyway.” Maika clapped her hands twice. “Back to work! We’re not done yet!” Right after she said that, she disappeared in her work room and came out with a roll gift wrap. When Arlong saw how she turned to a table to wrap-in something, he got very curious. “Strange, why should Maika-chan need, that? Is there really anyone she wants to give a present to? Hmm, time to spy on her.”

Not shortly after, the sawshark was standing behind the stingray, watching her like he was supervising Nami drawing maps. Maika stopped, turned her head to face Arlong and asked him with a slightly irritated smile: “You know Arlong-kun, instead of watching me like a creep, you could just ask me what I’m doing...”

When Arlong heard this this, he got a few steps back, harrumphed while blushing embarrassed and responded: “Y-yes, you’re right, sorry. Sooo, I saw you gift-wrapping a bundle with money. It was 1 million berry, correct?” At the same time following went through his mind: “Great now I look like a creepy pervert! And I know how Maika once mentioned how much she despises perverts!”

Maika just finished putting the money in an envelope and gift-wrapping it. With it in her hand, she told him: “Oh, this? This is the only reason why I actually haven’t forgotten about Christmas yet. For five years now, I’m sending exactly 1 million berry to a certain person as a present.”

She than pointed to the golden tree on the lobby desk and continued: “It actually has something to do with the only piece of decoration I owned on my own.”  
Like always, the others overheard the conversation and were curious to hear about it immediately.

“Interesting, tell us more.” Kuroobi demanded smiling. “I really want to know how this is connected Maika-san, chuu.” Chew told her joining him and Hachi was the most enthusiastic about it: “Nyuu, I also really, really want to know this phantom thief story Lady Maika!”

Seeing how his friends almost cornered her to tell the story made Arlong laugh wholeheartedly:  
“Shahahahaha, well, well Maika-chan I guess you really have to tell us or else we won’t be able to continue with our work, even tough we’re almost done.”  
“Urgh...” Maika sighed, folding her arms. “I guess I have no other choice… Let’s sit down on the couches so I can tell you ticks quite comfortable.”

As everyone made themselves comfortable, Maika folded her arms and legs, took a deep breath and began her story: “It was on this very day, five years ago. I was still a beginner as a phantom thief, and as Kagami I was about to steal the Golden Christmas Tree…”

5 Years ago

Kagami jumped through a window of a mansion with the treasure Golden Christmas Tree under her arm. She landed on the snowy ground and was about to make her escape. The newcomer-phantom thief heard the voices of the marines say in the background, that they build roadblocks and ships on all coasts, so she won’t be able to get away.

However, Kagami had no problems at all to sneak away of the roadblocks and when she arrived at a lonely path near a cliff she giggled to herself: “Ngahaha, everything goes just so smooth, as always. I’m not long in this business and already that successful, gosh I’m amazing!”

When she was about to ask herself what cake she should defrost to reward herself, she suddenly sensed with her observation haki an attack from above. Kagami jumped back and dodged five short spears that way.

“Who are you!? I know you’re there, show yourself! You’re no Marine, are you!?” She shouted out alarmed.

At the same time a mysterious figure hid themselves in the conifers. The figure was dressed in a purple-hooded cloak with black shoulder pads, a long yellow scarf and long white gloves. Also a belt, full with these spears but the most noticeable trademark was a white mask with dark purple lines over both eyes and a crossed over red and blue pattern, reaching from the upper to the outer sides, which covered their entire face.

The figure was definitely the attacker and they threw another bunch of spears. Kagami was able to dodge them again but it was far from over because the attacker jumped from tree to tree while throwing their seeming endless arsenal of spears from almost every direction.

Soon Kagami was close to the cliff and was angry about herself and being still a beginner: “Dammit, I may be a genius and did lots of research but it lacks me in real life combat experience… so what is the enemy going to do now?” Her idea was with the next attack just to to disappear by carefully climbing town the cliff with fast accurate jumps.

Her prediction was correct with many spears from several directions flying at her at once. Kagami took action by jumping in the air but there was something she didn’t expect.

Suddenly in a matter of a little moment, her attacker came out of their hideout, jumped with impressive speed at her and thew spears inside her left shoulder, right upper leg and stomach with full force from the point-blank. Flinching and shocked by this attack, Kagami needed a second to realize, that she dropped the treasure and that the impact of the attack pushed her so far, that she and the treasure fell deep down the cliff.

Standing at the edge of the cliff, Kagami’s attacker watcher her fall until they heard a voice behind them: “You did well Speer. Just what I would expect from an experienced professional assassin. But I don’t think that woman would die from something like that. Make sure you find her and bring her to me.” It was Rear Admiral Kadar, the Marine once beaten by Fisher Tiger.

“Yes Sir!” Speer replied climbing down the cliff the same way Kagami planned to use.

The fall from the cliff was long and Kagami’s impact on the ground was with the head first. Kagami was badly bruised, all of her injuries were bleeding horribly and she was only still alive though to her extreme endurance. Because of the heavy head trauma, she was barely conscious and the only thing she was able to sense were the pain and the coldness of the snow she was laying in.

Not soon after, Speer arrived at Kagami’s crash site and was ready to pick her up with the words: “Don’t think ill of me.” But they were interrupted by a child’s voice saying: “I’s over here guys! Right over here!”

Speer flinched and disappeared when they realized that five children three boys and two girls. “Someone fell from the cliff!”  
A little girl with blonde curls explained. “You’re right! Someone’s there!” A little boy with straight, short black hair agreed.  
“She’s still alive right?!”  
“Uaaahhh, there is so much blood!”  
“We should get Uncle to look at her!”

On the next morning, Christmas Eve, Kagami woke up slowly. She felt that she was laying in a bed but even more she felt the pain of her wounds. When she fully regained consciousness, she sat up a bit and examined her surroundings: She was in an unknown but casual-looking sleeping room and when she examined herself, she noticed that she was heavily bandaged, her upper-body, her head and her right leg especially. She also noticed that the person, who patched her up, put some of her clothes on again and seemed to cleaned them, her silver shirt and her ultramarine blue pants.

Not shortly after she tried to explain the situation to herself with throbbing headaches, she heard somebody coming in the room she was. It were the five children, who found her.  
They ran energetic to her and started to talk about non sensual things for Kagami: “We did it! The angel woke up!”  
“She fell from far above and she looks so unusual and beautiful, she must be a Christmas Angel!”  
“Hey, where are our presents Angel-san?!”

This was one of the worst-case scenarios, Kagami imagined to end in. She absolutely despised children, they were bratty, stupid and annoying in her eyes and she felt just so uncomfortable in their presence and these five were the perfect example for this. Kagami was tired, hungry and her her head, no everything hurt, she really didn’t need some brats bragging her for presents.

But before her nightmare could go on a young man with blonde-wavy hair, jade-green eyes and in a casual white shirt and black jeans yelled at them angry: “Heeeeyyyy, how dare you to say such things to an injured person?!”  
“Uaaaahhh, sorry Uncle Satoshi!” The children apologized whiny and Kagami asked herself, what was going on.

After finishing scolding the kids, the man named Satoshi turned to Kagami and talked to her in a polite and relieved manner: “I’m so glad, you regained consciousness. I was so shocked to hear you survived falling from that cliff. I gave my best to patch you up. I hope it’s good enough, I am a doctor, you know?”

After Kagami thanked him for his good work, Satoshi invited her to join them for breakfast, which Kagami as hungry as she was, could never reject. On the breakfast, when Kagami was eating from her bread, was told that these five children were all Satoshi’s nephews and nieces.

“That’s right!” The little girl with the blonde curls agreed. “Our parents all died in an accident on a way to a family vacation. We five had luck and Uncle Satoshi was too busy to come with us. He’s our only family left.”

A little chubby boy asked the stingray: “Hey, Angel-san, where did you come from?”  
Trying not to sound annoyed, she replied: “I am no angel, I am a feathertail-stingray fishman. My name is Mika and I am a world-traveling magician.” She didn’t want them to know that she was a phantom thief, magician was an excuse for her outfit and as a pseudonym she took her true name Maika and just cut the first a.

"Woow, cool a magician! Please show us some tricks!” The children begged her and Kagami told them, that she’ll show them later some. “But what is actually a fishman? Does this explain why you are so big and why you have these round things on your arms and a spiky tail?” A girl with messy brown hair asked confused.

Kagami herself was confused as well. They didn’t know what fishmen were? And they weren’t terrified or disgusted by her non-human appearance and even called her beautiful.

“Fishman are a different smart species on this world besides humans.” Satoshi explained to his kids with a friendly smile. “They usually look like humans but are way taller and physical stronger and have attributes of any aquatic species. They can breath under water and on land and are amazing swimmers. In case of Mika-san you can see she’s, like she mentioned before a feathertail-stingray fishman. You can see that in her grayish-brown skin, round ray-wings on her lower arms and that long, spiky tail. Don’t touch the tail, it’s venomous! Anyway besides the things I told you, fishman aren’t that different from humans. We can spend blood between each other and even make babies together.”

“Ewww, that last part is gross Uncle Satoshi!” The children complained because in their age didn’t usually want to hear anything about making babies but the rest really fascinated them:  
“But everything else is really cool! I didn’t know there is something so cool out there!”  
“Mika-san, what fishmen people are there besides rays? I really want to see shark, octopus and eel people!”  
“If fishmen do exist, are there mermaids, too?”

They continued to ask innocent questions, full of curiosity and fascination for the people of the sea.  
Kagami didn’t expect something like this at all especially a reasonable and accurate description from Satoshi, an adult human, who usually were full of racism and prejudgment of her species.

Noticing the perplex face on Kagami, Satoshi rubbed the back of his head and apologized flustered: “Oh, I’m deeply sorry. I shouldn't have talked about you and your people so careless like that.”

“It’s totally fine, it was actually really good explained to be honest.” The stingray wanted to cheer him up. “To be even more honest, you are the first adult human I met, who doesn’t share that usual opinion on us...”

Hearing that, convinced Satoshi to tell her something more: “As you already know, I am a doctor and I really love my work. I think a real doctor should be able to help everyone and so I did research on fishmen and found out, that your internal structure isn’t so different from humans, too. Many doctors refuse to treat injured fishmen and use the argument, they didn’t know how to properly treat them or worse, they didn’t want to help ‘disgusting monsters’. I know you people have to suffer a lot from humans, but I want to show that there are exceptions, too.” He then set up the warmest smile, he had. “We just have to learn more from another.”

These were the exact words, Queen Otohime once used. And she was right, they were good humans out there, too besides Whitebeard. Kagami couldn’t believe those words first because she only heard and witnessed human atrocities but now she met a benevolent human being with the doctor Satoshi, her opinion may change…

“Wait, adults are mean to you guys Mika-san?” One child asked confused.  
“Hmm, yes. She turned to the child. “The most adult humans treat us like monsters and tell their children, that we are bad, even if we never did anything to them...”  
“Maaannn, why are adults so stupid!? The only nice one is Uncle Satoshi!”  
“Someone should tell them off!”  
Somehow this brought this brought a sweet smile on Kagami’s face.

“Oh, Mika-san there is something, I didn’t understand...” Satoshi mentioned.  
“Huh, and that is?”  
“When I was treating you, I tried to take your mask off but it just wasn’t possible. Actually, it still sticks to your face.”  
“Simple, I’m a magician. I used a certain trick to let it stick to me but I’m not telling you what trick it is.”

The truth was that Kagami was the only person able to put on and remove this mask. She couldn’t explain this weird kind of magic but it sure was beneficial.

“Anyway, you can stay here until your wounds are fully cured, no matter how long it takes, I can sleep on the couch.”  
“Yay, spend Christmas with us Mika-san!” One child cheered.

“Good idea, a magician with tricks will be nice when we get no presents again...” The boy with the black hair said and Kagami gave him a curious gaze. The boy explained further: “Actually, we already know, that something like Santa or a Christmas Angel don’t exist, the parents or other relatives buy presents for the kids. Uncle Satoshi is a very good doctor but the bosses in his hospital are jerks and underpay so much, that he can barely take care of himself and us five, so we never can get any presents.

When Satoshi heard how his pessimistic nephew just counted facts made him quite depressed and tried to cheer the kids up: “Don’t worry, if you really want presents, I can quick run into a store and buy you very nice things.”  
“Give up, Uncle Satoshi…” His nephew told him off. “If you do that, we’ll have no money for food and the rent..”  
The expression on the man’s face went sadder and sadder, almost a miracle that he didn’t tear up.

The rest of the day was spent with Kagami showing the kids magic tricks and she and Satoshi also told them more about fishmen and tried to make sure, that these five won’t belong to another generation of racism. The stingray fishwoman may hated children but she knew that she only had to endure this until her wounds were cured…

In the late evening, she told them a goodnight story:  
“And then! The phantom thief turned around, and 100 Marine soldiers shot off their guns all at once!” Kagami was really into the story, she came up with but before she could finish, Satoshi told the kids to go to bed and so Kagami decided to go to sleep as well.

Laying in the bed, she decided on the next morning to look for the treasure she dropped and closed her eyes. It was completely dark in the house, only the fullmoon illuminated the rooms and everything was quiet, except the sounds of footsteps. The owner of them, Speer entered the room, where Kagami was and slowly came closer to the bed with a spear in their hands.

Before they could ram the spear into her, they heard a voice behind them say: “Hey now, you shouldn’t do that to someone who’s sleeping.” It was Kagami, now in her full costume again, leading against a wall with folded arms and a smug grin.

Speer turned to the bed and saw a dark figure who only looked like Kagami but soon disappeared.  
“I prepared Doppelman, a doppelganger out of my shadow, just in case.”  
Speer was quite annoyed by this but not shocked about it: “Hmpf, I already asked myself when you are going to use your...no Warlord Gecko Moria’s Kage-Kage powers!”

It was no secret, that she had access to the Warlord’s devil fruit powers, since her debut as phantom thief. The Marine’s first action after that was to visit the Thriller Bark only to see, that Gecko Moria was still alive and well and the Warlord himself had no explanation for this phenomenon.

“If you didn’t kill him and ate the fruit yourself, how could you access those powers?!” Speer asked, not understanding anything.  
“I hear this quite often and I always give the same answers: Maybe I asked Mr. Moria very nicely to lend me his powers? Who knows...Who knows..?”

The phantom thief responded with a mocking tone in her voice. Even through the mask Kagami was able to notice how angered Speer was at her but she just continued speaking totally relaxed: “As you can see, I am a Master of Shadows, too. But don’t worry, unlike Mr. Moria, I don’t like to steal and cut off shadows, I’m more into manipulating them, especially my own. Anyway, sorry but I don’t plan on dealing it out with you here, see ya!”

Immediately after Kagami said her last sentence, she jumped through the window and began to ran away in an impressive speed and Speer followed her. However, the noise both made was enough to wake the five children up and to look out of the window.  
“This is bad! Some weird guy is chasing after Mika-san!”  
“We gotta let Uncle Satoshi know!”

While Kagami was chased through the snow, she was heading to her crash site, where she dropped the treasure. It wasn’t snowing since she was found and though to her strong sense of smell and the blood loss she suffered, she was able to locate it quite fast and just ran, while avoiding every of Speer’s attacks.

Even when it was no big task of dodging those spears, it still was an annoyance and wonders what their problem was. This was when one important detail came into her mind: “Now that I think about it, they came into the room without silencing the sound of their footsteps… It was like they wanted me to notice on purpose and make me flee outside, but why?”

However, this train of thought was stopped when she found the Golden Christmas Tree, she dropped earlier. Kagami picked it up and was now ready to face her opponent. The phantom thief was happy, that the full moon shined so bright this night and showed her shadow, that making possible to use her Kage-Kage powers. Despite being sure, she would be able to win without her devil fruit abilities, Kagami really loved to use them on every occasion because doing all this crazy stuff with her shadow was such fun.

She still haven’t fully recovered from the stab wounds and the fall, but she had enough energy again to move properly and to use her devil fruit.  
“Listen, buddy!” She told them with pointing at them. “Last time you got me because of me having little to no fighting experience at all! But now I’m completely adapted to you and I don’t think you can keep up with me but I hope you can still make this interesting for me! Shall we begin?”

Kagami’s shadow began to grow by a bit and pieces of it seem to detach, forming into many small stingray-formed things. They floated around Kagami, who ordered: “And now attack my sweet little Brick Rays!”

Of course this was her version of Gecko Moria’s Brick Bat attack, with rays instead of bats.  
The rays were on the attack and Speer tried to block them, however there were too many and they were too fast. Also, Speer was able to hit some but, they immediately reformed. Usually the Brick Rays attacked with their pointy tails but Kagami let them attack with their flat side as more blunt attacks and they weren’t as forceful as they could have been. Speer noticed that, she didn’t want to badly injure them.

The actual idea behind it was that Speer lost focus and balance. After she succeeded in completely confuse them, the rays merged together into Doppelman behind Speer and it gave them a strong kick in the back, enough to catapult them but not to break any bones.  
Her next act was to let Doppelman turn back into her regular shadow and give the in her direction flying Speer, a perfect coordinated kick to remove the mask with force.

Speer yelped in shock when their mask fell into the snow. But also Kagami experienced a moment of shock when she was able to see her attackers face: “You! You are-?!”

Right after the second, she realized who attacked and wounded her, she heard really familiar voices. They were Satoshi’s nephews and nieces, who followed them in distress.  
“Why are you kids here!?” Kagami demanded to know.  
“It’s terrible, Mika-san! Uncle Satoshi is missing! That person must’ve kidnapped him!” The kids tried to explain while coming closer but…

“You idiots! Don’t come over here!” Kagami yelled at them very vocal but it was to late, they yelled in total shock and disbelief when they saw that Kagami’s attacker was their beloved uncle Satoshi.

With pale faces, they asked him if this was just a bad joke but in response, their uncle tried to cover his face and overwhelmed begging them to not look, trying to explain the situation but he was interrupted with more people entering the snowy field:  
“What are you doing Speer?! Hurry up and finish off Kagami!” Real Admiral Kadar yelled.  
The children were just confused and didn’t know what was actually happening there:  
“What’s going on?! Why is this man from the Marine’s calling Mika-san Kagami and Uncle Satoshi Speer?!”

“Hurry up and catch her!” Kadar ordered and he grew even more annoyed when he saw how Satoshi hesitated. “What’s wrong? Have you forgotten you orders?”

The voices of the kids begging him to stop made Satoshi remember things, that forced him to be the way he was now. Once he was a doctor and an assassin for the marines with the codename “Speer” because of his fighting style. After a successful mission he was heavenly injured and took a long break and decided for a carrier as a doctor instead. One day his nephews and niece became orphans and he just had to take care of them. Living with the children made every day feel like a fresh breath of air for Satoshi. As someone, who only had known battle and how to treat wounds, he learned many things. However on the day Kagami sent the advance notice, someone rang on his house bell.

“We’ve been looking for you Speer. It’s been a while hasn’t it? It were Kadar and his unit of Marine soldiers. Satoshi was clearly displeased by the presence of the Rear Admiral and asked while suppressing a forceful tone: “What do you want from me? I’m not an assassin anymore.”  
That made Kadar laugh and reminded the doctor, that he still wasn’t retired from the Marines yet.  
“As I heard, you adopted orphaned family members right? Would be a shame if something happens to them because you refused to take orders from a higher up...”  
“Please don’t! These children are innocent! Let them out of this!” Satoshi snapped, breaking in. His orders were to catch Wildcard Kagami, while returning to his life as an assassin once more.

After proceeding this, he took one of his spears to resume the battle but Kagami just spatted on this:  
“Give it up. You cannot harm me. You had plenty of chances to get rid or me. But you couldn’t do it, could you?”  
Not only Kagami’s words but also the words of the children made Satoshi shudder in doubt:  
“Stop it! Get back to the nice Uncle Satoshi!”

In the moment Kadar saw Satoshi showing his vulnerability, he hissed, calling Satoshi a useless whelp and decided to take matters in his own hands. With that he announced he would catch Kagami because of the “Only alive” on her bounty of 28 million berry and to kill Satoshi.

Suddenly there was a loud noise, as if something massive was coming close. It didn’t take long until even more marines arrived with their full arsenal of guns and cannons. Kagami was worried, but not because of herself, because of the kids, who were completely unprotected. She still hated children but that didn’t mean that they should die.

On the marines first attack with their weapons, Kagami and Satoshi dodged them all and jumped powerful in several directions. Satoshi rushed to the children to protect them and Kagami to the cliff and has been cornered. Satoshi and his kids saw that and the doctor wanted to help her somehow but suddenly they heard something unexpected.

Kagami laughed, she laughed loud and wholeheartedly as if she was ridiculing the Marines, who had driven her into this corner. After she calmed down, the children asked her what was wrong with Kagami answering: “This is the perfect timing. I can show you kids the continuation of that bedtime story. The one about the phantom thief in a pinch. And how she got through such an absolutely hopeless situation!”

The phantom thief started to jump up the cliff a bit until she landed on a small plateau of it. In an attempt to stop her false escape, Kadar ordered her to stay still or they’ll shoot the children. Satoshi was shocked and disgusted by that but Kagami told him to stay calm and pointed on the ground as a signal, Satoshi saw Kagami’s shadow right in front of them, where it shouldn’t be!

“Okay, go on, Mr. Rear Admiral. I’m sure you won’t be able to do that anyway.” Kagami provoked the Rear Admiral. Who of course in his lack of intelligence fell for it and ordered a salve of gunfire at the doctor and his family.

They thought, they were going to die but when they opened their eyes, they realized that every single bullet and cannonball was blocked by a huge dark stingray-formed thing in front of them.

Cackling, Kagami explained: “And how do you like my Brick Ray Shield? My Doppelman, my tangible shadow is invincible, the perfect shield for you, ngaha.”

“Amazing! Mika-san is such a great magician!” The kids cheered, not knowing that this was the work of a devil fruit and Satoshi just sighed deeply in relief. That infuriating Kadar and he yelled at her: “Tch, fine but now you can’t use your shadow anymore, so we’ll just focus on catching you! Still something sassy to say?!” With a sweet but mean giggle, Kagami responded: “Of course I do. Serves you right!”

“Fire!”  
“Kagemusha!”

These two words fell right before the gunfire was fired at the plateau of the cliff, where Kagami was standing. The impact of the gunfire, caused a massive cloud of snow and dusk. Kadar already celebrated his victory of arresting a wounded and unconscious phantom thief but was interrupted by the cheering of children and the gloating laugh of Kagami.

The laughter came from a direction Kadar would never have expected. When he turned into that direction, he saw Kagami standing in front of Satoshi and the children. In disbelief, the Rear Admiral turned back to the now completely shattered plateau. On that was floating something, Kagami’s shadow.

“Ngahahaha!” Kagami mocked him with her laughter before she explained this: “As someone, who hunts me should really know that I’m able to swap places with my Doppelman anytime. You can never win against me with those tiny peashooters!”

She explained, following with a grumbling sound, as if something was getting closer. Kagami noticed that they had no idea, what was the meaning of this and felt free to enlighten them: “You don’t know? You caused it in the first place.”

“A-Avalanche!” The Marine soldiers yelled in an attempt to run away but they were too slow. Kadar and his soldiers were all buried in masses of snow. Kagami and the others should have been buried as well, however Kagami put herself and them in a Black Box of her shadow and warped them out of the avalanche’ range.

When the phantom thief removed the Black Box, they were able to fully realize, that they were safe. Kadar was able to release himself from the snow, but only his head only. He gave Kagami a hateful gaze, when she came closer to him. She returned the hateful gaze with a gleeful, victorious smile:

“How’s that? According to your face is staying cool not you biggest strength, huh? Even when covered under a pretty snow blanket, ngahaha. Well, before you’re completely frozen over, I’ll call some help to pick you up.”

This was the last thing the phantom thief said before turning around and leaving cheerful with the treasure under her arm while the defeated Rear Admiral cursed her out.

“Wait Uncle Satoshi! You really gonna give us to an orphanage?!” His chubby nephew asked shattered. “I’m sorry. I lied to you all this time… I have no right to take care of you...” Satoshi apologized sad and distressed. “Come let’s go to my home and tomorrow I’ll take care of everything!”

“You coward!”

Satoshi turned back to them when he heard his blonde niece yelling at him: “You’re really leaving us alone, even if you are our only family?! Sure you nag around quite often and are overprotective, even it you are a klutz yourself! But I still want you stay with us!”

All five then ran to Satoshi, crying: “We don’t need any Christmas presents! We don’t need a cake or a big feast or anything! All we want is to be together with our dear Uncle!”

The voices of his nephews and nieces let Satoshi tear up as well and he quickly took the kids in his arms and thanked them deeply for their endless kindness.

What nobody knew was that Kagami listened to the entire conversation before she disappeared into the forest with a warm smile.

The little family arrived at home and when Satoshi was about to reach for the key, he looked down and saw an envelope laying on the doormat. Confused he picked it up and after the kids returned to their room, he opened it and did his best to not freak out and brought out a loud gasp instead when he saw the 1 million berry inside it.

There also was a little note inside where was written inside:  
“Hope you like this little miracle. And thank you for patching me up.  
\- Your Christmas Angel”

Pressing the bundle of money on his chest, the doctor’s eyes turned into waterfalls of tears of joy when he sobbed: “No...thank you. Thank you so much Kagami, for everything...” Then he rushed to a late night store to buy everything he needed to make his kids a wonderful Christmas.

Back in the present

Maika interrupted her listeners everytime when they tried to interrupt her but now that she told them that she was finished, she could prepare for the a nice asking round, or better said: A pushy cross-examination with Arlong being the candidate.

“Woah, hold on a sec! I have lots of questions to this story! The most important is: Why did you have the Kage-Kage no Mi, the devil fruit of a former Warlord?! I thought your devil fruit is the Arashi-Arashi no Mi?! And I’m pretty sure you don’t have the Kage-Kage powers anymore! Don’t tell me you just switched your devil fruit because that’s just impossible!”

On one point Maika told them everything they missed since their imprisonment, like Gecko Moria losing his Warlord position and being pronounced as dead, the death of Whitebeard, a new Emperor and on. But now she wanted to answer his question of the devil fruit issue...more or less answering:

“Who knows how I did that? Maybe I borrowed it from Mr. Moria but then I replaced it with my current one?”  
“You know that’s impossible!” Arlong snapped annoyed by her not giving a clear answer.  
“I looove doing the impossible.” The stingray gave back in a sassy way.  
“Did anyone ever tell you that your talking in riddles quirk is annoying as heck?”  
“Yup. You, everytime I do this.”

His urge to punch her was strong but he also new that she would just dodge of block the punch, still wearing that smug grin. Messing with people was just too much fun for this woman, a trait Arlong could relate to well too good. And keep trying to talk about this had no sense either because everytime Arlong tried to press out some information of Maika she just does the same thing: talking in riddles to avoid the question and annoying the asker so much that they give up.

But before the sawshark could think how to act next went Hachi between them.  
“Nyuu, don’t fight please!” His head turned to Maika with a smile: “That was a great story Lady Maika. You really showed it these Marines and that you donate every year 1 million berry to the poor family that helped you is so sweet.”  
As reaction Maika gave the octopus her sweetest smile: “Thank you Hachi-kun. At least one of you guys gets the message.” Right after that she gave Arlong her smug grin and he mumbled: “Sometimes I really hate that woman...”

Kuroobi finished his third cup of coffee and said to Maika: “Showing gratitude sure is understandable also the one million, since you’re crazy rich but why every year, this was just a human who patched you up once and even tried to capture you afterwards.”

“Satoshi-kun was forced to do this and immediately retired completely from the marines after I solved the problem!” Maika instantly made sure for them to understand and continued in a way more calm way: “Why I do that? Well, isn’t Christmas the best time for some good deed and stuff? And since up to this point, I didn’t have any friends or family, I decided to support this little family and I don’t care that they are humans. Satoshi-kun treated me even though I am a fishman and the kids didn’t even knew what I am until he and I explained it to them. I just don’t see things black and white. True, majority of humanity is disgusting or boring trash, worst both, but in a pile of rotten apples are always some pretty apples and when I find these pretty apples, I’m ready to appreciate them.”

This statement of Maika left the three ex-prisoners stay silent and look at each other for a moment. Hachi of course didn’t and had to think on something else, what he had to bring out: “Nyu, nyu hearing you talk about apples Lady Maika, made me hungry. How about you let me use food from your storage and I can prepare us a wonderful feast for tomorrow?”

“Oh, yes, Maika-san that’s a good idea!” Chew agreed.  
“A wonderful feast is also part of a typical part of Christmas.” Kuroobi added.  
“Everything that has something to do with food is fine by me.” Came from Arlong.

Just to irritate them, Maika acted like thinking this thought for a few seconds with a long “Hmmmmmm” sound. This went until Arlong snapped in impatience and shouted at her:  
“Come on! You’re only doing this because you just want to mess with us!”  
“Ngaha, you’re right. Okay, I’m in. Hachi-kun, serve yourself on my food storage and make us something really good.”

The octopus cheered in gratitude and ran right into the food storage.

“So then...I think it’s time for me to go now.” Maika hummed while putting out her mask.  
“Where are you going?” Chew asked confused.  
“Giving the 1 million berry to Satoshi-kun, where else?” The stingray explained but her tone quickly changed to really sarcastic. “I mean only if this is fine by you for me following my own tradition even when it comes with helping huuuumans...” 

She rolled her eyes while everyone knowing, that she will do it anyway and they weren’t even in the position to object to this.  
Trying to stay cool, they told her that everything was fine and she can go on without them nagging about anything. That pleased Maika and when she was about to leave Arlong called after her.

Maika turned around in curiosity asking what his matter was. The sawshark didn’t look at her when he rubbed his back and being clearly quite uncomfortable with saying: “M-Maika-chan, I’m sorry for before...I really shouldn’t have yelled at you so much. You just told us the story we brought you to tell us...sheesh, I was acting like a total jerk...”

Maika blinked for a brief moment but then returning with her hand on her neck and an embarrassed look: “I accept your apology Arlong-kun. But I also have to apologize because I behaved like a total asshole the entire time with my sassy attitude and you were just curious. Anyway, we both should’ve known better but that’s over now. Well then I have to leave now, see ya tomorrow in the morning.”  
She gave a final sincere smile before finally leaving.

When the stingray was gone, Kuroobi turned to Arlong and patted him on the bag.  
“Good thing that you two made up so fast again. Lucky that Maika-san is despite being stubborn also really smart and realizes fast. But also great that you apologized first, Arlong-san.”

“What the heck are you talking about?” Arlong asked annoyed. “Don’t act like I never apologize at all. I always apologize to a friend when I realize I screwed up and Maika-chan is our friend.”  
The manta ray chuckled and had agree to this: “Yes, that’s true. After the time we spent here, I can clearly say yup, Maika-san is our friend.”

“I would really like to know if Maika-san considers us her friends, too...” Chew questioned.

“Who knows? I’m curious as well what we actually are for her. But I’m pretty sure she doesn’t hate us or else she wouldn’t do so many things for us. Like...letting us live here with her in the first place.” Arlong stated convinced but then his expression changed to slight disappointment: “Man I wish we could give Maika-chan a Christmas present or something. But that isn’t possible since she’s the one with all the money here and I don’t have a clue what to give her in the first place.”

“Yeah, that’s true...” Kuroobi agreed. “I’m not even sure if we would ever find something. After all, that lady already has everything.”  
“Right!” Arlong agreed back. “Maika-chan is unpredictable but I can imagine too well how she would react if we would give her something she doesn’t need.” He then started an impression of Maika in form of folding his arms, putting on a displeased face and speaking in an unimpressed voice: “Thank you guys...whatever, I have better things to do now. I’m just going to toss this thing into my storage and change the topic to avoid further awkwardness.”

That made all three of them laugh for a moment but Arlong was the first to calm down: “Okay, that was mean, I have to admit. Don’t misunderstand me, even if she can be confusing, unpredictable, bossy and exhausting sometimes, I really do like Maika-chan and I hope we all can become good nakama with her.” His friends nodded to this in total agreement and just decided to just not bother their socially awkward, unofficial nakama the best as they could over the holidays.

Meanwhile, Kagami was flying through the air, thinking about various things like:  
“Satoshi-kun will be so glad, when his Christmas angel comes to bring him the matters to have a perfect Christmas with his kids, who are now teenagers. My gosh, who would have thought, that I would ever legitimately celebrate Christmas. Especially with a bunch of guys, I just met a short while ago by freeing them from the most secure prison ever. Anyway everything goes quite well even if they can be exhausting sometimes, Arlong-kun in particular. That temper, sheesh he reminds me on myself in many points, maybe that’s why we have many but harmless arguments, ngahaha! They make things even more interesting for me and that’s awesome.”

Like the moody person she was, Kagami started to ask herself something: “Selfish as I am, I only keep them with me because they’re interesting to me and prevent boredom. That’s the only reason, isn’t it? I mean I kinda like these guys? How do I actually think about them? It’s not negative, I’m certain about that and as long as someone doesn’t bore me, they are more likely good with me and if we fight, we get well again quickly. But I don’t know if I can consider them my friends, I mean how could I? I never had a single friend in my life, I have no idea how this friendship and nakama stuff works. Wow, a genius of my level doesn’t know how something works, who would have thought? I don’t even have a clue if they even consider me a friend, more like a benefactor or something.”

After the last sentence, she brought out a humorless laugh and but shook her head to get that out of her mind: “Come on Kagami! You don’t need to worry about something so minor, as long as everything is under control, you’re fine and you do always have everything under control! Think more optimistic, it’s a good time and I am in a good mood since Arlong-kun. And since, I have some money with me besides the 1 million, I should go into a store and buy something nice for these four, yup that’s a good idea.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was more relevant to the plot and the relationship between Maika and her housemates than I intended but I'm satisfied with it.  
> Next one is chapter 10, where a certain character, relevant to this story, celebrates their debut.


	10. Encountering the Cursed Captain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tw//lots of blood and attemted suicide
> 
> Kagami is going to steal a painting alone this time and meets the most infamous person of Fishman Island and both have the same goal.

Everything just started normally on a harmless afternoon after Maika’s horrortraining. Her victims or in other words the guys, who she was training, slumped down on the couch in exhaustion.

“Is it just me or get Maika-san’s training sessions more brutal from time to time, chuuuuu?” Chew wanted to know, wheezing.  
“Hey, don’t nag around!” Maika demanded before drinking from her water bottle. “I only raised the difficulty because I noticed the magnificent progress you made in that short time. You can pat yourself on the back for that.”  
“Did she just praise us?” Kuroobi whispered into Arlong’s ear, who responded: “Yes...I guess so...”

“Of course I praised you, I can do that, too!” The stingray hissed, showing that there is nothing she won’t hear. “I observed that you improved massively in that short time. You are now much stronger than to the time we met. I always sensed a certain talent in you guys and you can trust me when I talk about talent. I mean I was described as superbly talented since I was a little child. “

“And now she just switched to gloating...” Chew mumbled, what Maika of course heard that and threw her now empty bottle at him but the smelt-whiting fishman dodged that by leaning his head to the left.

“Ngaha, see? You are able to easily dodge a quick attack like that thanks to my training.”  
Of course she predicted that to happen. Chew noticed that and called her tricky while passing her the bottle back.  
Maika gave all three of them a satisfied smile while telling them: “Fine, now that I proved my standpoint, there is something I have to announce.”

“And that is?”  
“I’m going to steal a treasure in two days. But it’s in the New World, the West Blue, so I’m going alone this time.”  
“Oh, cool. Who did you target and what are you going to steal?” Kuroobi asked focused.  
For that, Maika quickly went into her room and came out with this morning’s newspaper and the advance notice, she already wrote.

Advance Notice  
Tonight under the shining moon, I’m coming for the painting, The Cursed Ship of Legends to steal it from Mr. Leopold van Bauhaben with skill and grace.  
Phantom Thief Kagami

The stingray went immediately to the further explanations of the owner and the treasure:  
“Bauhaben is a slimy art collector, more polite but on a similar level of despicable as Denaro. Buying paintings, sculptures etc, from auctions all around the world. However rumors tell, he sometimes uses shady methods to obtain certainbpieces of art. And in this newspaper article is written about his latest acquirement, The Cursed Ship of Legends, a century old painting of the legendary ship, the Flying Dutchman. It was once painted for Vander Decken IV and it was told, that only members of the Vander Decken family are privileged to own it but since there was no Decken in ages, Bauhaben decided to make it his own. And I’m going to steal this exact painting.”

“Tch, what bullshit!” Arlong commented about this story. “There still is a Vander Decken with the Flying Dutchman out there, the ninth one who wields that name to be exact, I even met this guy.”

“I know, Captain of the Flying Pirates, Princess Shirahoshi’s stalker with the epithet, Cursed Captain.” Maika agreed, rolling her eyes. “Wait you met him?!”

For the first time Arlong experienced Maika to be shocked about something besides the little story with the photos in the library. The sawshark didn’t waste any time to tell her this little story.

“Yes, I did when I was forming the Arlong Pirates. I tried to recruit him and the swordsman Hyouzou but both turned me down. Vander Decken told me following.”  
He now started an impression of this man: “Me? You want me to join your little pirate crew as a subordinate? Ridiculous, I’m a man, who follows his own rules and never takes orders from anybody, I think. I don’t benefit from your plans in the slightest so I refuse, no thank you, I think.”

His friends laughed and praised the sawshark for his impression, even Maika had to giggle.  
She laid the newspaper on the table and said while playing with the advance notice: “Anyway, I’ll take this painting and if he doesn’t come himself for it and proclaims it as his own, it’s his problem. I just don’t want this slimy Bauhaben to have this beautiful piece of history!”  
“Oh, I didn’t know you’re interested in history.” Chew wondered.

“Of course you didn’t because I never told you.” Maika explained bluntly. “I have lots of books, filled with history of the world and legends. If Ohara would still exist, I would have moved there to learn about the Void Century. Scholar was my second choice of carrier, my first of course being phantom thief. And since the first Vander Decken is an interesting tale with most likely more behind it than you think, I would love to go on the one and only Flying Dutchman! Maybe there are ages old books on board with content we need to see!”

It was a pretty amusing to see Maika being all enthusiastic about an old, real existing ghost ship. Everyone could understand why she wanted to steal that painting so bad.

On the day of her departure, Maika told her housemates to use the time to train on their one, what they were more than willing to do. Especially without her terrorizing them. As Kagami, she was on her way to Viridian, the island of artists and Bauhaben’s residence. After hours of Wind Traveling, she reached the island in the afternoon. The stingray turned into air just to turn back in a back alley and took the mask off to become Maika. Her idea was to spent the few hours before the heist with exploring the beautiful capital of Viridian.

The buildings were all in top condition and there were many trees alongside the streets. The city really valued it’s beauty and had a rather good economy to accomplish this beauty. The first place Maika wanted to visit was it’s national park, full of pretty flowers, waterspout fountains, bees, ladybugs, butterflies and a plaza for artists to paint or creating other art in this gorgeous environment.

Fascinated about the works or several artists, Maika walked around a bit until she would find something that really caught her interest. Around 15 minutes later the stingray witnessed how a couple sat on a park bench and let themselves draw, however the couple wasn’t what Maika really interested, it was the street artist.

The first thing she noticed about him was his size. Even if he was sitting, she could see that this slim-build artist was really tall, he had to bend down a bit to paint. But his massive height wasn’t his most distinct trademark, it was the fact that the beige-skinned man had four lanky legs, all angled up to even over his chest thought to the low stool he sat on, his left foreleg was also wrapped in a bandage.

Now she was really curious and decided to come a bit closer. Because she lowered the distance, she was able to see the appearance of the artist way better. Besides his four legs, there was also his hunch, that put his head on equal with his shoulders. Under his white fedora were long black wavy, spiked edged hair. He was also wearing a red, long-sleeved shirt and a brown overall under his white with paint stained apron. He was also wearing two pairs of sandals and red gloves.

Between his gloved fingers, Maika could see big webs. That led to her conclusion, that he was a fishman, but she couldn’t tell which kind of. His appearance was overall bizarre and Maika somehow had the feeling to know him from somewhere.

That thought just won’t leave her alone and she had the strong desire to talk to him and to find the right topic, she decided to look at the painting he was working on.  
The man noticed her and asked her in a very polite tone: “Baho, does the young lady have an interest in my miraculous art?”

First she was a bit flustered because he called her 30-years old self young and wanted to nod back friendly but that didn’t work because she then saw the actual painting and…  
“Pffff...Ngahahahaha!” Maika suddenly bursted out, holding her belly.

“What’s so funny!?” The artist hissed enraged, showing his sharp teeth.  
“That…! That…!” Maika wheezed. “That looks awful! Ngahahahaha!” Some tears formed in her eyes from all the laughing.  
“Shut up! Even this is a fine piece of art you rude bitch!” He yelled at her blushing in anger and embarrassment at once.

When the couple heard Maika’s comment, they were shocked and stood up to confirm this for themselves. And on the canvas, they saw a painting of them so bad that even an elementary schooler could’ve made this better, it was that awful.

“We stood still for 30 minutes for this abomination?!” The man yelled at the artist, in complete disbelieve.  
“Well, art takes time and I just draw what I see...” Was the artists respond with a flustered giggle.  
“You are insulting us you reject!” The woman yelled, what sounded more like screeching. “We only took you because you only wanted 10 berry as payment! Guess a cheap price makes cheap quality! Nothing else to expect from something like a fishman, who doesn’t belong into a city of beauty like Viridian!”

At the point, when the woman started to insult the artist because he was a fishman, the fun for Maika stopped, she got angry and interfered:  
“Hey, watch your tongue old lady! He may be the most awful artist in existence but that has nothing to do with him being a fishman! There are many fishmen who are great artists! If you want a beautiful portrait of you two, I can recommend you a smelt-whiting fishman who can do the job!”

She once saw Chew doodle her mansion in his freetime and it looked amazing.

“Keep out of this fish and don’t dare to call me old again! An ugly species like you has no right to judge what is good and what is not!”  
The urge to just poison that piece of garbage with her tail was strong but she had enough self control to not do it. Maika was already ready to bring out a counter but suddenly the woman’s boyfriend came to word:

“Hey, hey honey, calm down. The lady is right, that guy has no talent but we shouldn’t let out our frustration on all fishmen. Especially when she’s right and they are some talented fishman-artists. In addition, I don’t think fishman are particular ugly...”  
The last sentence ended with a dreamy glance to Maika, making obvious that he found the stingray way prettier than his actual girlfriend and that was more than amusing.

“You’ve caught yourself a really lovely man here. He’s so smart and sees things how they really are. I think somebody that lovely deserves an equally lovely partner.” Of course Maika said this just as a provocation, that explained her smugness in her flirty glance to her boyfriend.  
“I am lovely, stupid fishbitch!” The woman now completely lost it. “Come honey, we leave and look for a real human artist!” Were her last words when she slammed down the artists canvas and tugged her boyfriend away with her.

Maika was relieved that this was finally over but she observed something very interesting at the moment, the woman and her partner turned around: The artist quickly reached out with his long arm and snatched the wallet from her back pants pocket. Her only comment to this was: “Good reflexes, they didn’t notice a thing.”

After he thanked her for the compliment, the man got up on his four feet and showed how large he actually was. He was even taller than Arlong and Maika only reached him a bit over his waist. Maika had to look high up and he low down to actually talk eye on eye with each other. When doing this Maika was able to have a clear image of his face: narrowed dark yellow eyes, a short scraggly goatee, a long wavy mustache, very thin pointy nose and a cat mouth.

“You’re not going to tell them?” The man asked, turning his head to the couple, who were looking for a new street artist.  
“Nope, not intend to. Bitch deserves it, even if I feel sorry for her boyfriend.”  
“Mister...” The stingray tapped his hip. “I believe, you should get away from here before the couple realizes, you stole from them...”  
“Argh, dammit you’re right, I think!” He cursed and ran into the little forest of the park abandoning his art utensils.. It was a strange view with his four legs but Maika didn’t mind and just followed him.

“Hey, why did you follow me? I thought you don’t care that I stole her wallet!” The fishman asked her confused.  
“I was in the mood to. Plus there is something I want to know.” She responded.  
“Oh, and that is?”  
“I’m pretty sure, you know it yourself, that you’re a horrible artist and it was more than obvious that they wouldn’t have paid you, even if I wouldn’t have laughed at your painting. So why painting there in the first place and only wanting 10 berry?”

“Bahohoho...” The man laughed amused. “That’s simple to explain. I never intended to earn money with my horrible paintings. My plan from the start was to paint people and when they see my atrocious masterpiece, they freak out. When they are too busy yelling at me, I take the chance and steal their wallet. I’m very skilled at pickpocketing, I think. That way, I make more money than all actual artists here, bahohoho!”  
“Ui, sneaky, I like that.” Maika commented and began to introduce herself with her pseudonym “Mika”. The pickpocket then introduced himself as “Vanguard Eckens” and the two fishman did a formal handshake.

“Pleasure to meet you Ms. Mika and thank you that you defended me from that bitch earlier even if I even wanted her to be angry at me.” Eckens showed his appreciation while taking off his apron.  
“You’re welcome. I just hate racist comments against us fishman. Oh, by the way I am a feathertail-stingray and you are a cat shark correct?”  
Eckens cringed a bit when he heard that and corrected her: “You’re wrong, I’m not a cat shark, I’m a bullhead shark. But don’t mind, many people make that mistake when they meet me for the first time, mostly because of my mouth, I think.”

Both fishman laughed over that fact a bit and Eckens came up with an idea: “Now that we properly introduced ourselves...how about we go eat something? I found a neat cafe, I pay.” He hold up the stolen wallet and Maika agreed to his offer.

On the outside of the restaurant, Eckens ordered their favorite dishes, grilled freshwater fish and a nonalcoholic cocktail for himself and pancakes and a coffee for Maika. Their conversations were mostly smalltalk, where they found out that both were tourists, here to look at the beauty of Viridian, well except that Eckens were also there to “earn” some money, what Maika just laughed away. The stingray was positively surprised about this man’s formal mannerism. He didn’t even intentionally tried to get on her good side, it was just the way he talked.

Their casual talk went to something more interesting when Maika mentioned the reason why she talked to him in the first place: “Mr. Eckens, there is something I really need to know. It’s also why I caught a certain interest in you. I have a feeling that I know you from somewhere, like we met each other before I started to laugh at your painting. Have you maybe an idea?”

The bullhead shark thought about it for a few moments, while playing with his mustache and then brought out his answer: “No, I don’t have a clue. I always remember a pretty face. Even thought I also have the feeling that I met you once before. Those voluminous ash gray hair and those unique dark blue eye tattoos are oddly familiar to me...”

“Oh, those are birthmarks, not tattoos.” Maika corrected him. “Well, when you don’t know it either then it was just a misunderstanding. Something like this can happen.” She sighed in disappointment because she was so certain to know him. Anyway now that this was done, she looked at a large marble building on top of a hill. 

Eckens noticed this and commented to this: “Oh, you have interest in Leopold van Bauhaben’s largest museum, I think.”  
“Correct, interest in his latest acquired painting, that should be in his exhibition this night, The Cursed Ship of Legends.”

Soon as the bullhead shark heard the name of that painting, his eyes narrowed even more much to Maika’s surprise. He started to explain with sudden seriousness: “I did some research on that guy and this painting. I can’t stand him, he doesn’t suppose to own this painting in the first place! It should be in the possession of a Vander Decken, where it belongs! It’s family property!”

According to the look in his eyes, he was really angry, Maika even assumed he was personally offended by this.

“I totally agree Mr. Eckens. Good thing that Phantom Thief Kagami will steal it from him this night during that exhibition.”  
“Wh-wha-wha-wha-what! The famous phantom thief is going to take it!” He was more than upset when he heard about Kagami and Maika could think that she heard him mumble “Damnit!”

He got up from his chair and gave her the money to pay the food and the drinks.  
“I’m sorry but I need to leave, there is something I need to think about, it’s very important. It was very nice meeting you Ms. Mika, I hope we can see each other again someday, goodbye!”  
With that he left with no further words and left Maika alone on the table. She couldn’t fully understand why he overreacted so much about something that hadn’t much to do with him but she was pretty sure, they would meet again pretty soon, on the exhibition.

The night of the grand exhibition was soon to arrive, the sun was setting and Kagami was preparing herself for her more grand heist. To find out more about this place, she decided to explore it in her logia form.

In the exhibition hall, she saw a big safe made of seastone and nothing else. Probably the people only should’ve laid eyes on the painting. In front of the safe, she saw Bauhaben and one of his guards talking. From this conversation, she could hear that the painting was inside this safe, who could only be opened via entering a password only Bauhaben knew and he would only do it when the exhibition starts. That way Kagami would never be able to steal it before. Kagami found that train of thoughts more than amusing, especially because one of his own underlings found the flaw in the old art collector's logic:

“Uhhmm, Sir… I’m sorry telling you this, but doesn’t Kagami like to make a big show out of her heists especially with a large audience? So I suggest she will come to steal it when the safe opens...”  
Bauhaben cursed and Kagami could have laugh in pure schadenfreude because of his pure stupidity and the neat idea she came up with. 

It was still time before the exhibition started, not a single visitor was there yet, so she decided to sneak into the underground of the museum, if she would find something interesting there.  
The underground was quite dark, with antique lanterns used as low lighting. The corridors were high but slim with pillars, almost like an old castle, Kagami found it visually pleasing.

While sneaking around there as a bunch of air, she noticed two guards knocked unconscious. She was sightly relieved when she found out, that they were knocked out with strong punches in the stomach and it weren’t life-threatening wounds but the person, who inflicted them seemed to be physically strong. The phantom thief decided to look further and to be extra observant since there seemed to be another intruder besides herself.

In her logia form, she moved pretty fast through the corridors unseen by everyone, not if there were many people down there to begin with…  
Soon she saw a familiar face, she already expected to be there but not in the underground and not around half an hour before the exhibition even started.

“Oh, lookie, what do we have here? If this isn’t my favorite, totally legitimate street artist?” Went through her mind, seeing Eckens leaning against a wall, sneaking around by himself. The first thing she noticed about him was that we was wearing different clothes now.  
He was wearing a yellow fedora, green overalls, that reached just below his knees with decorative buttons on the straps, a white shirt, massive beaded necklaces hanging on his chest, three golden bands on each of his ankles and a yellow cape draped over his shoulders. Also he took off his red gloves and he really seemed to love ruffled edges on his clothes.

Kagami decided to pay the large fishman a little visit. So she materialized right behind him and he asked himself why it suddenly got so windy.  
“Yo.” Kagami tugged on his cape and Eckens had to hold his mouth to not scream.  
“Who are you and how did you get so easily behind me?!” He hissed at her, trying to be quiet.  
Another nice feature of her mask is that nobody can find out that Maika and Kagami were the same person unless she reveals herself.

The bullhead shark took a closer look at the phantom thief and was struck by realization:  
“You are Phantom Thief Kagami aren’t you?!”  
“The one and only, ngaha!” She stroke through her hair in pride but she stayed careful since she knew he was very displeased of her to be there.  
“So you really did came here, huh?” He asked pretty relaxed.  
“Of course I did. When I sent an advance notice, I must steal the treasure written on it. In that case the new painting, which is going to be shown soon.” Kagami explained gleeful and continued. “And what does a random dude like you here in the underground of a museum of a despicable art collector, besides sneaking around and knocking out guards with his fishman strength?”

The tall man was shocked that she found out that it was him but before he could gave an answer, Kagami already predicted his intentions: “Hmm, maybe you have the same plan as I have and that is stealing the painting?”  
Suddenly a sharp blade would’ve sliced through her body, if she wouldn’t have been intangible and the blade just sliced through air. Eckens drew his knife back, he had hidden in his sleeve and he gave her an irritated glare. “The rumors are true...you really are a wind logia...damnit!”

“Correct, I could’ve dodged with my genius prediction skills but just letting attacks going through me is more fun. But there is one thing I have to admit, that was a great sneak attack while standing right in front of me. You hid your bloodlust really well.” She praised him for his attack. “So I am correct. You want to steal The Cursed Ship of Legends and I’m in your way, huh?”

“Tch, yes, you are correct that I’m here for the painting but I’m not here to steal it, I think!” He hissed at her but the last confused Kagami a bit: “You know, there are not many things I don’t understand but why are you here in the underground, even attacking people if you’re not up to steal anything?”  
“I am just here to claim, what’s mine...” Eckens explained serious.  
“To claim what’s mine...” Kagami repeated and began to fully realize the situation: “That means you are…!”

“Correctly. You’re as clever as everyone says. Yes, I am the Cursed Captain Vander Decken IX and I am The Cursed Ship of Legend’s rightful owner.”

It was one of the rare occasions where Kagami was struck with something like shock because, who would’ve thought that the pickpocket street artist who stood her pancakes and a coffee was actually the infamous descendant of an even more infamous legendary pirate. Everyone who researched pirate history knew the legend of the first Vander Decken and his Flying Dutchman, especially the people on Fishman Island were aware of that very legend.

“I just knew it was him when I saw him in the park! That explains my sudden interest in him” Went through Kagami’s mind, being relieved that her feeling wasn’t just imagination. “I just forgot how he looked like and of course he doesn’t remember me! After all this was 18 years ago and just right now my memories slowly start to return...”

However, she stayed calm and wanted to start a conversation with him while investigating that place together, since there were many thing she needed to know from him:  
“Well talk about plot convenience...”  
“Huh?”  
“Nevermind, shouldn’t you be in jail? The last time I’ve read the news on Fishman Island, I read that you were arrested with the New Fishman Pirates.”

“Baho..bahohoho...” Kagami heard Decken giggle and he was ready to gleefully explain it to her:“You’re not wrong, I was arrested and should’ve been behind bars in the Ryugu Prison but here it comes… around a week ago, in a moment of carelessness, my crew managed to sneak into the prison and helped me escape! And now I try my luck as pirate on the surface, bahohoho!”

So the Flying Pirates were back in business but not underwater anymore, Kagami however couldn't be very glad for him since she had a certain problem with him:  
“I would congratulate you for your achievement since it’s not really my business but…” Suddenly she inhaled and released:  
“Marines, there is a pedophile around here, who tried to marry a child!”

“What the hell are you talking about?!” Decken yelled at her and couldn’t understand her point.  
“You don’t know? Everyone on Fishman Island thinks you’re a pedophile because you wanted to marry Princess Shirahoshi since she was like 6 years old!” Kagami clearly brought out her disgust while explaining this and Decken seemed very shocked about the fact and actually got angry.

He leaned down on Kagami’s height to say following into her face: “Listen Missy, this is a biiiig misunderstanding here! It’s true that I decided to marry her when she was only six but I only wanted to marry her because of a special ability only she has and not because she was a brat! In fact I considered it a problem that she was still a brat to that point and waited until she reached the legal age for marriage in the Ryugu Kingdom, that being 16! Oh, and another thing you should know, I only started to feel attracted to her when she grew older! In those 10 years I constantly imagined her as an adult! And so that leads to the conclusion, I am not a pedophile, got it?!”

Right after the bullhead shark calmed down a bit from his little rant, Kagami responded to this:  
“Uh, okay...sounds legit...at least I can now talk to you without being totally disgusted.”  
“Yeah, yeah, fine by me, however the agenda Shirahoshi is closed anyway, I think...”  
“Huh, weren’t you deeply in love with her?”

Suddenly, Decken’s annoyance quickly changed to depression, showing that he was a really moody person: “That’s true but...sob... after I was arrested, I was faced with an ultimatum. Either I take my curse from Shirahoshi and spend the rest of my life in prison or I get executed right on the spot. Because I like living, I chose the first option. And now, that I’m free and on the surface...I am forced to give up on my lovely Shirahoshi and it hurts so baaaaad!”

He broke out in comedic tears and Kagami tried to cheer him up. However this made him even more upset: “You don’t understand this!” Decken snapped. “It’s true, I am attracted to Shirahoshi but I only first laid an eye to her for the sake of my family! Everyone of my great centuries-old bloodline looked for one specific mermaid princess and this legendary princess is Shirahoshi! It was the dream of my great ancestor and I could’ve been able to fulfill this very dream but I failed!”

His expression changed from teary anger to just absolute frustration. “And now with losing Shirahoshi as my target, I can’t return to Fishman Island ever again. And in case I can’t bring an heir to this world, who continues that legacy, the dream of the legendary Vander Decken family is destroyed and it is my fault! I would bring shame to my great bloodline, that is the worst thing that could’ve ever happen to me! Even worse than death!”

The way he said this...he sounded so shattered and desperate about this and in some weird way Kagami even felt a bit sorry for him, if this tormented him so much that this is even worse for him than death. One thing was sure, he took insanely pride into his family name and would do everything to not do it any shame.

Kagami took a deep breath but not to shout out for the Marines but to tell him calmly and even a bit empathetic, that she still disapproved to what the bullhead shark tried to do to Princess Shirahoshi but that she could understand him now.

Decken then rubbed his tears away and told her that he didn’t need a phantom thief to pity him but in a more polite way than he told his crew when they tried to cheer him up. “It’s fine again, I think. The reason why I wanted to avoid the execution and live was to find a way to protect my family’s honor. I found it, I have to retain the painting of my ship!”

And now he changed to straight up seriousness and determination:  
“It was taken from us a few generations ago! I don’t know how this happened but it did. Looking for it was my first decision I made when we Flying Pirates entered the surface. Lucky me that I found this latest newspaper article about the bastard who now has it. When the painting is going to be shown in front of that audience, I’ll go into this hall and in front of everyone claiming what is mine! Normally I would just use violence to get what I want, but this is different! Violence will only be an option if this isn’t going to work but I first have to make that announcement in the diplomatic way! Everyone needs to know who I am for this, for my family pride’s sake!”

When he said this he tried to slice the stingray up again. And it just went through her like last time but this time her expression was more serious and not as smug.  
He cursed at the result: “Damnit! I thought I could get you this time...But I can’t let you have this painting, no matter what! It belongs to me, ya heard phantom thief?!”

“Hey, stay where you are intruders!” A bunch of five guards ordered while running in their direction.  
“Ui, looks like your constant yelling finally drove some attention, Mr. Decken.” Kagami stated, faking a bit surprise over the guards.

“Bahohoho, only five little humans?” Decken mocked, twirling his mustache.”They will be dead in little seconds!”  
But at the second Decken took a knife in any of his two hands, he felt a gust of wind behind him and then saw how a small tornado formed right in front of the running guards, who were drove in.

The tornado swiveled them around for a few moments until it let them clash with the walls, knocking all of them unconscious.  
The tornado then materialized into Kagami and she laughed victorious while cleaning her suit.

“Good that I took care of this. I don’t like to kill people especially if it is unnecessary. And that’s why I won’t let you kill anybody.”  
First impressed to see a fragment of her powers in person, he then was a bit confused. It was his first time, he met a thief with morals. Decken already heard that Kagami mostly avoided combat even if she shall be incredibly strong. He just couldn’t understand this woman.

As response, to prevent awkward silence, he places his hands on his slender hips and said:  
“Not, bad, truly not bad. To turn yourself into a small tornado. So that’s your wind logia-type devil fruit. It’s nice to see that I am not the only fishman with a devil fruit. How’s it called?”

“It’s the Arashi-Arashi no Mi, the Storm-Storm fruit. Pretty cool, huh? And very versatile. I’ve only heard rumors but your devil fruit is the so called paramecia-type Mato-Mato no Mi, the Mark-Mark fruit isn’t it? I know vaguely how it works but I didn’t know that you can purposely remove your curse from your target.”

“Oh, I sure can. To be honest, I told this Neptune when he actually wanted to execute me, so I brought up that ultimatum myself to survive. And removing the curse is quite simple, I have to touch another person to lock on or I have to touch my target once more and say ‘Lock Off’. I hope it didn’t disgusted Shirahoshi, that I touched her with a hand I haven’t washed in 10 years.”

Kagami said nothing to this and distanced herself by a few steps.  
“Eyy, after that I washed it, I even washed my hands today as well I promise!”

After that short stupid moment Kagami summarized: “Let’s just say your Mato-Mato fruit is for purely destructive purposes, like assassination, isn’t it?  
As reaction to this, Decken shorty hold his chin in thoughts but then started to explain something surprising.

“You’re right at first, I think. But there is something way more interesting to it to explore! You must know, the Mato-Mato no Mi is another of my family legacies. Every heir used it and just passed it to the next generation when they are about to pass away. And so, many ancestors of mine were able to explore the fruits whole potential and wrote it down in books about their journeys and history I have on my ship! Okay most of these books are very old and in a very bad state, I think. I try to decipher what’s written in those since I became an adult. Because I’m not quite an experienced archaeologist and because there are a lot of these books, this takes time...lots of, lots of time...and I’m also a very busy pirate so...”

Even though Kagami was very interested in these books and wanted to talk with him about this more, she decided to put this to another time and told him that he drifted off a bit. He received that message, apologized embarrassed while playing with his pearl necklace and got back to the point:

“Anyway in one book I could decipher not long ago, that there are written some other ways to use the Mato-Mato no Mi. Like, hmmm, a way of controlling the flight path of the projectile you threw so it his a certain spot for example. Controlling who you are marking with your hand, a permanent mark memory, where you only remove someone as your target with locking off, including only throwing objects only at someone you intend to. Or even how the so called awakening would work, I think. Something like throwing any kind and form of projectiles at your target without having to touch them and manipulating their flight path but even if you miss while manipulating them, they would them just fly in the targets direction anyway!”

He then folded his arms prideful and made with his right hand a victory sign while having a malicious grin: “Something like telekinesis, I think. And imagine how amazing and versatile telekinesis is, bahohoho!”

“Yup, that sounds impressing Mr. Decken.” Kagami admitted. “Keep practicing, maybe you will archive this someday.”  
And now she was encouraging him, he couldn’t understand this. “Aren’t we enemies here because we are after the same?” Went through his mind. “And yet we are having genuine conversations here. It’s just like she doesn’t hate me at all even if I am a feared undersea pirate...”

Reasons for this were, that Kagami wasn’t scared of him at all, second the positive start they had when they met each other under their pseudonyms: you are good in her book when you stand her pancakes. Third, that Kagami’s moral complex and her ways to interact with several types of people can be really weird sometimes. And the fact that she didn’t know details about the stalking of Shirahoshi, like his attempt to destroy the entire island with the ancient ship Noah just to kill one person.

After talking to him and walking around the underground for so long, Kagami reached into her tuxedo and took out a fancy pocketwatch. The stingray took a short look on it and when she put it away again, she stated: “Well it’s time to steal the treasure. The exhibition starts in a few minutes.”

“Fuck!” Decken cursed and panicked. “I must hurry! Bahooo!” He ran into a random direction but quickly stopped again and asked himself loud: “Where do I have to go to enter the exhibition hall?”

“Three corridors, left. Then you’ll find stairs, that lead to a storage room. Leave it and then go to the left, that leads to a door, that can let you enter a backdoor of the exhibition hall.”  
The phantom thief explained to him casually with a kind smile.

“Oh, thanks, bye!” Decken said and started to run again, however only for a few seconds. “Wait, why are you telling me this and fucking help me?!” He asked her and turned around. But when he did, Kagami was gone. He reminded himself that this wasn’t the time for questions, he had to hurry.

“I welcome you all to my great exhibition!” Bauhaben announced in the huge exhibition hall, that was now full of visitors. Many had Den Den Mushi to broadcast the whole event. Viridian was full of art lovers, that makes every exhibition of the island’s greatest art collector to something everyone needs to see.

The visitors were all excited and listened to everything the art collector had to say. He placed himself in front of the safe in an elegant manner, very proud of himself.

“I present you a very special painting today. You may have seen it in the newspaper before but in real, it’s even more beautiful. The tale around this painting says, that it’s a perfect still life painting of the legendary ghost ship, the Flying Dutchman, once owned by the cursed pirate captain Vander Decken! A few of you history interested people may know about this legend. It was painted for his descendant Vander Decken IV. This man took patent on his family name so only members of this family were allowed to own it. But since none of them showed up in centuries to take the painting, I felt free to receive that very historical item. I will now open the safe to present you, The Cursed Ship of Legends!”

The safe opened, revealing the inside of it. Everyone looked fascinated at the century-old painting, took pictures, filmed it and Bauhaben gained lots of compliments and praise.  
As reaction to this he laughed in arrogance and stated while adjusting his suit:  
“Yes, yes, it’s a historical day! This valuable part of art history is now in my possession!”

“Not if I have something to say about this, too! Bahohohoho!”

“What is this?! Don’t you dare to interrupt my exhibition!”  
“Sorry but I haaaaaaaate taking orders. Nobody shall ever tell me what to do.”

Bauhaben and the visitors looked in the direction of the backdoor and were shocked at the appearance of the four-legged intruder, who walked slowly in the safe’s direction, full of confidence.

Around him, he could hear the voices of the audience:  
“Who is this guy? He’s huge!”  
“And he has four legs, how disgusting!  
“That’s a fishman with a cat mouth...” “What does a different fishman doing here besides Kagami who actually should have been here already?”

Decken ignored all of their words. He never cared about what people he looked down on thought of him. The only person he focused on was Bauhaben, who asked who in the world he was and what he was doing here.

The bullhead shark adjusted his fedora and then positioned his arms crossed over his chest with each of his hands showing a victory sign: “Bahohoho! Who I am? I am a pirate with a name you all here should know too well. I am the Cursed Captain Vander Decken IX and I am here to claim that painting in the safe as mine!”

The hall was first filled with gasps and then whispering. People discussed if he really was who he claimed to be. The art collector had a distressed frown and was sweating.  
“Curses! A Vander Decken has really appeared and Kagami is maybe somewhere here, too!” He thought. “Even if he has the right to demand it from me, I’m not planning it giving it to him! It’s mine! Screw this family patent!”

Vander Decken reached out with his hand, signalizing Bauhaben should hand out the painting: “Come on old man. I am its rightful owner, you already mentioned the patent yourself and I planned to go on with the diplomatic way. Don’t force me to use violence!”

He was very confident about this and has laid down a vow to himself: “I’ll do it! I have to do it! I must! Because, if I fail this, I cannot protect my family's honor, the worst case...If I would really fail, then I’ll take my own life right on the spot!” He recalled in his mind

The art collector was really nervous but he had an idea. He forced a smile on his face, laughed in arrogance and responded: “Hehehe, you?! You’re supposed to be the descendant of Vander Decken?! You’re just a pirate! If you’re the real one, then prove it!”

Decken was amused by this, laughed in his distinctive laugh and began in slow steps, to come close to Bauhaben: “Oh, you want proof that I’m the real deal, huh? Bahohohoho...” He asked ironically in an intended creepy tone.

“Well you may know, that every Vander Decken’s epithet is Cursed Captain and that comes because of the legend the majority knows. And Fishman Island also has a few history enthusiasts, who know that there is another reason why we are called like that. A tale tells, that if you are touched by the hand of a Vander Decken, you will be cursed to be chased by weapons until the end of your days. Well let’s see if this is true, bahoho...”

It was more than clear, that he planned to touch Bauhaben and use his powers on him. But when he reached the very center of the hall a sudden pain in his stomach struck him.

It was shot at Decken by one of Bauhaben’s guards. His shirt and overalls were stained in a deep bloody red. The gunshot caused a much bigger bleeding than it actually should. The reason was that Decken still hasn’t nearly recovered from his encounter with Hody Jones yet and the gunshot opened the wound in his stomach, causing an immense bloodloss. It wasn’t over with that, even more shots were fired at his stomach, making the wound even worse than it was before.

The heavenly injured bullhead shark sank on his knees, holding his wound with both of his hands, screaming and moaning in pain. His cries of agony were heard in the entire museum but not a single person even thought about of calling an ambulance for him. Everyone just stood there, silent, watching him bleeding out.

Panting, Decken raised his head to look at the art collector and saw his sadistic smile, clearly enjoying the pain of the suffering fishman. Bauhaben didn’t say anything but his malicious expression told every of his thoughts. He knew exactly that this was the real, no imposter and that he actually should hand over the painting to him but didn’t want to. Rather he would just watch a pathetic pirate, coughing blood and perish with nobody coming to help him, he was nothing more than a fish acting high and mighty…

Decken knew, that he was going to die here...dying from these bullets and humiliated by the stares of everyone. He failed...his life lost its meaning to him. But he refused to die in the way this dirty art collector intended to. If he would die, then in his own way! He reached for a knife to stab himself in the heart and pass away in pride as Vander Decken IX, the pirate who only followed nobody other’s way than his own.

When he was more than ready to end his own life, he suddenly felt the same wind, he felt in the underground. It confused him, preventing him from the stabbing. And suddenly a tornado formed in the exhibition hall. It almost tile a wall between the audience and the inner circle where the safe, Decken and Bauhaben were.

The tornado slowly disappeared and manifested itself as Kagami next to the wounded Decken, wearing a wide grin. “Ladies and Gentleman, have no fear, Phantom Thief Kagami is here!”

She called out holding her right arm behind her back for some reason.  
Everyone looked amazed by the sudden appearance of the phantom thief and the audience actually started to cheer for her, since she was really popular and they anticipated a great show from her.

But instead of putting on her usual pompous behavior she just stood there, her face turned into a more serious expression, that than turned into anger and she yelled: “Shut up you fools!”

The way she shouted this out was intense. It silenced everyone, literally everyone in the museum, some of them were so overwhelmed by this, that they even lost balance. Decken didn’t felt affected by it but he could sense too well what impact this had on the others. He couldn’t decide if he should’ve been simply impressed by her or straightly terrified.  
When Bauhaben and more got up to their feet again, Kagami continued her speech: “You’re here cheering for me when I appeared but doing absolutely nothing when a man was shot down by several bullets?! Not even calling an ambulance?! Just watching him bleed to death?! I’m disgusted by all of you!”

“K-Kagami...” Decken panted, looking in her dark purple eyes. “You were here the entire time?”  
“Yes, observing closely.” She explained quietly, grabbing his shoulder, clearly expressing her worry about him. “You have to be treated Mr. Decken, that’s for sure. But can you still hold on for a while?”  
As response, Decken snickered, showing a bit of his arrogance. “Are you kidding me? I have a master level of endurance. I’m more than capable of getting through this.”  
“I’m glad to hear that.” 

She gave him a compassionate smile. “Because there is something I really have to tell everyone.” After she said that, the bullhead shark gave her a questioning look and she turned to Bauhaben and returned back to her usual attitude.  
“Ngahahaha! Don’t let you fool yourself by this old crook! He only denied the truth because of his slimy nature and just not wanting to accept, that he has no longer the right to own this painting!”

Everybody listened closely to what she said: “This man, you shot down in cold blood told the truth! He truly is the real Vander Decken IX and the rightful owner of the Cursed Ship of Legends! He was just here to take what he should own in the first place!”

This caused another uproar of discussion in the audience and she enjoyed how afraid Bauhaben was, especially because everything was recorded. But she wasn’t nearly as done yet: “So, now you know the truth. But it doesn’t really matter to me since I already stole the painting!”

“Whaaaaaaaat?!” Everyone shouted in surprise, even Decken. And they felt like their eyes would squish out when Kagami finally showed the arm, she hid behind her back and showed that very painting in her hand, presenting it with a large grin and a “Ta-da!”

“Wha..Wha...Th...Thi...This...is impossible!” Bauhaben stammered with his mouth wide open. “Give that back you dirty thief!”  
“Sorry but I haaaaaaaate taking orders. Nobody shall ever tell me what to do.” The stingray quoted, what Decken said at his entrance.

Because she didn’t listen to their boss, the guards, surrounding the two fishmen and tried to shoot her just as they did with Decken. Kagami just could have stayed there because the bullets had no effect on her but she didn’t want them to potentially damage the painting or even injure Decken even more. So she decided to blow each of the guards away with strong blows of wind she summoned.

“It’s true! She really stole my painting!” Bauhaben yelled when he took a look in the now empty safe.  
“Ngaha, sorry but I stole it and this now it’s his painting!” Kagami corrected him and pointed at Decken, who couldn’t believe her words.

“She stole it but is still saying it’s mine now?!” Decken thought confused. “Kagami is a thief and she didn’t stole it for herself but for me?!” His mind was filled with confusion, relief, shock, happiness with other emotions towards the situation and Kagami he still had to proceed. In that time he stared at the phantom thief next to him and the kind smile she gave him, really helped him to verify those feelings he had.

“When did you have the time to steal it?! Somebody would’ve noticed it when you sneaked into the safe!”  
Kagami sighed in slightly annoyance and answered this with: “Think for your own for once! I robbed you countless times now, so you should be able to figure it out for yourself when you really paid attention to my powers.”

“Your powers...” the art collector repeated and then was struck with realization: “No! You really...You took it when you made that tornado as a distraction!”  
“Bingo, you’re right!” Kagami confirmed gleefully. “It’s just one simple trick of the many things I am capable to do, ngahahaha!”

Once more, she blew the guards away, who tried to shoot her. On Vander Decken’s face grew a large smile and quietly said: “Amazing...she’s so amazing.” with a surprising blush…

Kagami then turned to him and told him: “I have the painting, it’s time to bring you into a hospital, you’re bleeding for far too long now.” “No...” Decken responded panting exhausted. “I have a doctor on my ship. It’s not far away from the island. I know you can fly, I’ll show you where it is.”  
“Okay, as you wish.” Kagami agreed and then turned to the audience.

“Well then Ladies and Gentleman! Now that I took the painting, the Cursed Ship of Legends, I’ll make my great escape! See you again under a different shining moon!”  
Then she hovered up, wrapped her arms around the large bullhead shark’s waist and escaped with him out of the museum.

In flight, they left the island, and it didn’t took long until she saw a spot in the ocean covered in a deep fog. Decken told her she should fly into the fog to arrive his ship. So she did and when entering the fog, she could see the legendary ghost ship, that was seen on the painting she stole, floating on the ocean: the real Flying Dutchman.

When the two fishman landed on the deck of the ship, Decken took some of his remaining strength to yell at his crew to come here as fast as possible. They listened to his orders and soon a crew of twenty fishman arrived, being absolutely shocked at the sight of their badly wounded captain and grabbed their weapons while giving Kagami hateful glares.  
“Leave her alone!” Decken ordered with a scratching voice. “Kagami helped me to arrive here alive and now help me, you see I’m bleeding!”

The ship doctor took his captain and brought him into the infirmary of the gigantic ship.  
Kagami knew, that it would take a while for them to patch their captain up and she still had the painting.  
She decided to sit down, lean against a wall and wait.

In that time, she looked around from the spot she was sitting and viewed the gigantic ship, she dreamt about to ever visit. It really looked like a stereotypical ghost ship but the fact that it was indeed real made it much more fascinating, especially because Kagami couldn’t find an explanation how it was able to float on the water with all the holes it had. How much she would love to visit every spot on the ship, especially these clock tower-like masts and how much she would like to express her excitement. But instead she just sat there completely quiet with the stolen treasure in her hands.

No member of the Flying Pirates even dared, talking to her. They just stared at the stingray, some giving her suspicious looks, asking themselves why she was here and helped Vander Decken. Others surveyed her closely from the distance, being amazed by her presence and appearance. But when Kagami stared back at them with a questioning look, they turned around nervously, not pretending she was there. Their opinions on her were very mixed. Something between admiration, gratefulness, fear and suspicion but Kagami didn’t care, she just continued to wait in this slightly awkward silence.

Kagami was recalling the events of this heist. The opinion she built on the conversations she had with Decken was complicated. Mostly she was able to understand his motivations despite them not being quite reasonable. He was willing to take every measures to archive his goal, no wonder, he was a pirate after all. In casual situations, like when they were eating together, he was very polite and comfortable talking to. His interest in history was something she could relate to and she liked his passion as amateur archaeologist. Another thing she was strongly able to relate to was his will to never be ordered around and only doing what he wanted.

He was also very expressive and talked with his hands a lot, she could observe how he always did the same repetitive gestures when expressing a certain emotion. Like playing with his necklaces when being nervous, tipping his finger tips and folding his hands when being in thoughts or talking about something, that interests him. His mustache twitched when showing annoyance and adjusting his fedora when being excited and taking in his signature gesture when being really excited.

Another habit she noticed was his adding of “I think” at the end of some sentences. Decken was very quirky, had deep lore behind him and was generally interesting for Kagami.  
She decided to like him and not feeling uncomfortable in his presence. A habit of hers to make a first impression of people, who caught her interest and she got along with, was to mostly ignore what they did in the past and only focusing on the details, she was truly interested in. It was the same with Arlong and the others, she only vaguely knew what they did but didn’t care, they were interesting to her and nothing else mattered.

However, there was something that still worried her about Vander Decken: The insanely pride, he took in his family name. It was intense and a strong drive in his life, just as she remembered it to be. He was so determined to protect the family’s honor that he was even more than ready to commit suicide when being in his hopeless situation. Kagami was more than glad to interfere before he could have done it.

Time passed, it was still nighttime but the stars weren’t visible because of the deep fog, that covered the Flying Dutchman. Finally the ship doctor and Decken came out again. The bullhead shark changed his bloody clothes and signalized with his gesture with the victory signs, that everything was fine. This made the Flying Pirates really glad and they ran to their captain. Kagami also decided to come close to check on him. The pirates went out of her way by themselves almost like a path so the shark and the ray could face each other.

“Captain would you please tell us what brought you into this terrible state?” A rather small fishman with lavender skin, bright brown hair and pointy ears asked.  
“Multiple gunshots in my stomach.” The captain simply answered.  
“Did Kagami did this to you and then just saved you to atone for her sins?!” Another fishman with peach skin, a purple hat and a blue-green striped shirt accused the phantom thief.  
“A! Silence, or I’ll punish you! I don’t want to hear any more negative statements about Kagami ever again!” Decken yelled at him clearly infuriated at the fishman simply called A.  
“Y-yes, understood Captain Decken!”

“Okay, Mr. Decken but now you tell us how you could bleed so badly by just one gunshot in your stomach. Either you have a bad coagulopathy or you were wounded before and that bullet reopened the wound. I would bet of the last one because I saw that bandage, wrapped around your foreleg.”

He started with his habit of tipping his fingertips when explaining: “Correct, it’s the last, I think. You probably heard of the New Fishman Pirates incident on Fishman Island. I was there, too. Trying to marry my Shirahoshi. But things screwed up and I somehow was confronted with their captain Hody Jones. He tried to kill me by impaling my stomach with a trident. I managed to free myself from it and touch and mark him with my left hand. Then I threw an axe at him, which he dodged but would come back thanks to my power. And when I tried to stab him with a blade I’ve hidden in my sandals, he bit me in the leg with his white-shark teeth and lend me in the path of my axe, which then sliced me. And as the cherry on top, I then fell around more than 100 meters down and hit my head. By the way my body hasn’t fully recovered from this yet.”

It was an extremely, almost ridiculous vague version of his involvement in the incident, like intentionally not mentioning his former alliance with Hody or the situation with the Noah.  
After a short silence, Kagami broke it with: “Are you stupid?! You cannot go steal something alone when you are badly injured! Don’t do this ever again Mr. Decken, you should take more care of yourself!”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry won’t happen again, but I just had to do it this time.” Decken responded and was touched by her worry of him. “But that wasn’t the end of the story...” He started and caught Kagami’s interest with her telling him to go on.

“Before I hit my head and passed out I vowed to myself to hunt him down as an act of revenge for trying to kill me. I would drive him into the ground physically and mentally, until he dies!”  
“And did you do it?” Kagami asked.  
“Nope, I changed my mind after I saw him in prison before I broke out, I think. Because of a weird drug he took, his body began to age drastically. In the end he and his four comrades became old, pathetic, weak geezers. It was such a pathetic view that I thought that this fate is worse than death. And so I decided to let him rot away like that.”

It sounded cruel but becoming like this was their own choice and Decken only decided not to kill.

Kagami just nodded at this and Decken said to her after looking at her more closely:  
“Now, that I notice, sorry that I stained your pretty shirt with blood, this is going to be hard to wash out...” “No problem, saving you was more important. Oh, and when talking about the reason we did all of this...here take this.” Kagami hold the painting to him.  
“You...you’re really giving it to me?” Decken asked, still not fully believing it.  
“Of course silly. It’s rightfully yours and I’m feeling better when you have it instead of that slimy art collector.”

Right after that statement, Decken took the painting, looked at it closely and silent. But then everyone started to hear him sobbing and suddenly broke out into tears: “Kagamiiiiii! Thank you so much for doing this for me! You’re so great!”  
Kagami smiled at those tears of joy and showed her appreciation: “Ngahaha, you’re welcome, I know I’m great. But I actually have to thank you.”

“Huh, why?” He asked confused, while wiping his tears off with his sleeve.  
“I really wanted that painting because I’m so interested in the tale of the Cursed Captain but meeting you...” She took a deep breath to tell him in gleefully excitement: “Made it possible for me to visit the real deal! The real ghost ship from the oldest sailing tale of all time! I examined it a bit and it’s so awesome! The immense size of your home, the spooky and thrilling atmosphere, I love it! I would like to see more of it!”

“Oh, uhhh, that’s great to hear, I can give you a tour through my great ship.” The flustered bullhead shark suggested, not expecting someone as amazing as Kagami getting so overly excited over his home but he enjoyed that.

The stingray’s reaction to his suggestion was: “Really?! Thank you Mr. Decken! Thank you! I really appreciate that!” Decken had to deeply blush at the soft touch of her hands when tenderly grabbing his left arm and giving him a sweet, sharp-teethed smile. He was thinking how cute and touching she was.

“Hey, Kagami is actually really nice and the Captain likes her, so that’s good.” The lavender-skinned fishman called B thought to himself.

“Oh, how does your ship even work Mr. Decken, I mean it floats on the water with many holes, it’s covered in this deep fog and just how?” Kagami wanted to know while pointing on several spots of the Flying Dutchman.

“To be honest I clearly don’t know it myself. I bet it’s just because it’s a ghost ship, it also can perfectly travel under water. It also hasn’t a ship’s wheel, it just sails where ever I want it to, I think. I just have to demand for it and in a few minutes I arrive at the wished spot on the ocean and it only works for me. Legit, I have no idea why this is that way. Probably it stands somewhere in those old books, I still need to decipher, wish me luck.”  
“Nope, you can’t tell me to do that because I wish you success, because I really want you to do this, it also interests me!” Kagami responded and the two and to laugh shortly.

After that, Decken ordered one of his crew members to bring the painting into a save room because after that, he had to tell Kagami something very important, which made the phantom thief really curious and impatient to what it could be, so she also demanded the subordinate to hurry.

When this was done and the subordinate returned, Decken first adjusted his fedora, suspenders and mustache. Went on three of his knees so that he was now on eye height with her, placed his left hand on his chest and reached with his right out to Kagami and in a formal way spoke the impactful words:

“Phantom Thief Kagami, you are one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met! You earned my admiration and respect in such a short time! I fell in love with you, marry me!”

The 5 most awkward silent seconds of Kagami’s life passed, and there were a lot of these seconds. After they passed, not only she, but also the entire crew of the Flying pirates, bursted out a loud:  
“Eeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh?!”

The shocked and overwhelmed stingray felt how her face turned red as a good cooked lobster and for once she was completely speechless for a short period of time. Kagami received a marriage proposal from a guy she just started liking.

Kagami started to stammer flustered with her hand covering her mouth. Slowly she came close to the bullhead shark in a shy manner.  
“Mr. Decken...I...I...”  
“Come on say it Kagami, no need to be shy, just say yes.”  
“I...I...I don’t like being a replacement!” And with her last sentence, the phantom thief smashed him with a punch into the next wall with his subordinated bewildered yelling at her for daring to punch an injured person.

They were running to their captain, who just collected himself again, being impressed by such a strong punch from someone who was clearly holding back. Kagami followed them by turning into wind and materializing in front of Decken again.

Finishing standing up and readjusting again, Decken asked her stunned, what she was talking about. The phantom thief crossed her arms and answered this with a strict look at him:  
“Like I said, I don’t like to be seen as a replacement! Just because you can’t have Princess Shirahoshi, doesn’t mean you can just go to the next amazing lady you met and marry her instead! That doesn’t work on me, I’m an individual with lots of honor and pride, not a replacement for someone incredibly desperate, who doesn’t feel honest about me!”

Decken started to understand her point but he then shook his head and tied her to explain as calm as he could: “Okay, maybe that sounded a bit like that but you misunderstood my message. I never saw you as something like a replacement, the moment I fell in love with you my dear Kagami. It’s true, I have to admit, I love two women now, Shirahoshi and you, however I feel different about you somehow. You are so strong and intelligent, you had completely control over the situation from the start. The way you talked to me and always listened to what I said despite, that I saw you as a nuisance and tried to kill you twice before the exhibition. And how you did all this for me even if you really didn’t have to. I was so touched by everything and your excitement when it comes to something that catches your interest as well as you smug, sassy and confident demeanor is just so cute and lovely...”

He then got on three of his knees again to talk with her on eye height once more: “My feelings for you are completely honest. It took years for me to actually fell in love with Shirahoshi but it took me only an hour to develop just as strong feelings for you. I am completely lovestruck, I think. Like I said, you earned my admiration and deepest respect, you are truly amazing and I want to be the man on the side of such an amazing person. So I ask you again. Would you marry me Kagami?”

So this was how Decken felt about Kagami, it sounded really honest and not desperate. Not lying to herself, Kagami was quite touched by this love confession. Especially he lowered himself to tell it her in the face on eye height and tried to be as mature and serious as possible. It wasn’t superficial or based on some family tradition, he loved her as a person.

But even after that and Kagami being really touched...she placed a hand on her chest and told him with an apologetic look: “I really appreciate and find your words really sweet but I’m sorry, I won’t marry you Mr. Decken.”

“Eh?….Nooooooooooooooooo!” Decken screamed out loud in misery, that even caught Kagami off guard. For a few seconds his face even seemed pale gray and his eyes blank white.

The devastated man started to tear up again but this time it were tears of frustration. After his head and hands twitched for a few seconds, he came very close to Kagami, that making her feel uncomfortable, and he asked her: “Why?! Please tell me the reason! Am I not your type?!” Shirahoshi’s rejection still haunted him...

“That’s not it…It’s just…” The overwhelmed stingray tried to say. “It’s just...I can’t get married to someone I just met!”  
“Huh?”  
“You heard right! I just met you a few hours ago! That you fell in love with me in that short time sounds unreasonable to me anyway! I like you and find you very interesting but something serious like marriage? Sorry but I just can’t do that.”

Decken stayed silent to this with a devastated look on his face when Kagami suddenly started to walk away.  
“Where are you going? Didn’t you want me to show you my ship?!” He asked.  
“Yes, and I still want to see it but not now. You know as they say, you always meet each other twice in life. So when we meet again someday, you can show it to me. Just now I don’t really feel like it. Well then, it was nice to meet you Mr. Decken, keep training your powers, goodbye.”

With that said, Kagami hovered up and flew away from the Flying Dutchman.  
On her flight she thought: “Yup, I indeed have a good story to tell those three at home, especially when they would ask, why I didn’t come with the painting. Also I need to tell Arlong about this conger fishman with the red-puffy hair, who wears his jolly roger on his neck. Maybe I find the time to talk to him next time I meet the Flying Pirates, he sure seems interesting.”

The phantom thief then shook her exhausted head.  
“But I guess, I leave the thing with the marriage proposal out, it still makes me feel uncomfortable. I hope leaving and letting time pass would help him to think things through once more and change his mind. I like him and if he’s my type or not, doesn’t matter, I don’t want to get married at all!”

One of the few times where Kagami couldn’t be more wrong. To this time she didn’t really know of Decken’s true nature when it comes to love. She came close to the wrong person…

Meanwhile on the Flying Dutchman, Decken, still crying, was still shattered by Kagami’s rejection of him. His closest subordinates A and B wanted to cheer him up like they did when he was depressed after Shirahoshi rejecting him:

“Captain...Hey, Captain! Things can only get better.”  
Unlike last time, where he yelled at them for not wanting their comfort, he started to giggle like the madman he truly was: “You know what? You’re right! Things only can get better!”

They actually would’ve been relieved of their captain’s recovered optimism, if it wasn’t for this insane smile he had when turning his head to them. Then he stood up, walked around up and down, gestured like crazy and started speaking out alarming things:

“When she turned down my astonishing love confession, I felt like I would die but everything changed when she told me the reason why...She just said, that it was too early for marriage, since we only knew each other for a few hours. That means if we would learn to know each other more and I keep being patient and stubborn on marrying her, my Kagami will change her mind soon!”

“Captain Decken...isn’t this a bit...”  
“Don’t you get it you fools?!” Their crazy captain bursted out. “It cannot be a coincidence, that I met Kagami under such circumstances and was lovestruck by her not long after I was forced on giving up on Shirahoshi! She said she likes me, encourages me to archive my goals on mastering my devil fruit and deciphering the old books of my ancestors. Even if I thought of her as my enemy when we met the first time, there was this chemistry between us from the start, I can feel it! Kagami most likely did, too, that’s why she talked to me so much and helped me!”

He took a deep breath, looked up into the foggy sky and shouted out in his most passionate way:  
“We are meant for each other! Destiny didn’t want me to end up with the Mermaid Princess Shirahoshi but with the mysterious Phantom Thief Kagami instead! My great ancestors, Kagami and I will be a great couple and steal all treasures in the world together! With her on my side, I could become an equally great pirate as you my most honorable, greatest ancestor Vander Decken I!”

Decken then interrupted his monologue, to turn to his crew members and when he adjusted himself, they tried to process what was happening:  
“The Captain is hella creepy again...” A thought.  
“Here we go again, Captain Decken, fell in love with another completely unreachable woman...” Went through B’s mind.  
And the conger fishman just questioned every of his life decisions to find a conclusion, how he could end up with such a new captain like this maniac of a bullhead shark fishman.

“Listen up crew!” Vander Decken spoke to them. “Being married to Kagami is more beneficial in one way or another and not only because I love her, I think. She has an intense presence, you probably sensed it yourself! Her powers, especially her wind-logia devil fruit are a great addition to our force and she is super intelligent, so she can come up with the most foolproof plans there are, it’s not controlling sea kings but still immensely powerful anyway! Plus she can fly, that matches us, the Flying Pirates! And...”

He suddenly started to giggle like a pervert: “I didn’t really pay attention to this when I considered her as my enemy but now I realize how beautiful and sexy she actually is!”  
In response, the conger, smashed his palm against his face and whispered: “Mother of Neptune, why?”

“Those short, voluminous and wild ash gray hair...” Decken began to slobber about Kagami’s appearance, clearly indulging it more than the average person. “Those dark purple eyes...so mysterious as if they would glare right through you, yet at the same time so soft when she smiles at you with those cute sharp teeth on this round and tender face. I also noticed these dark blue stripes under each of her eyes, partly covered by her mask. I wonder how she looks like under that mask, probably even cuter.” He was unaware, that he already saw her unmasked.

“And then those beautiful proportions, hidden behind this fancy tuxedo, have you seen those thighs and breasts?! Gorgeous, bahohoho... She would be perfect if she would just be a bit taller, small ladies aren’t usually my type but Kagami is an exeption...”  
His hands reached out to the sky again…

“I thought I would never found a woman that could ever equal Shirahoshi in giving me those feelings...I was right, I would never find someone in the vast seafloor, I had to go on the surface to find my true soulmate...Phantom Thief Kagami! I love you! I love you! I love you!”

When he finished his rant, the conger felt even more uncomfortable now, he turned away, telling himself: “I already knew that my Captain would be crazy but I didn’t expect him to be that crazy and especially not the horny kind of crazy… seriously, I wouldn’t even be surprised if he would've just nutted himself...”

A then tapped the large conger fishman on the back and told him partly comforting: “Well, welcome by the Flying Pirates Hammond...”

B thought his wicked captain would have calmed down from his thrill rush of emotions and asked him: “It’s great that you found love again Captain Decken but, what happens if Kagami keeps on rejecting you and has really no interest? I heard she is really stubborn almost as stubborn as you are...”

The crazy bullhead shark gave him first a death glare, that quickly turned into a sinister grin: “Oh, that? I really doubt that will ever be the case, it’s just a matter of time remember? She and I are soulmates, never forget! But if destiny should be really wrong and we aren’t made to end up together...well then...I just do the same, I planned to do when preventing Shirahoshi to end up with an other one. It’ll hurt when I really have to kill Kagami, I think. Let’s hope that will not be the case...”

“Oh, uhm...captain?”  
“Yes? What’s up….errrr, what was your name again?” “Hammond, Captain Decken...”  
“Ah, yes, Hammond, the new one! So what’s the matter?”

The conger named Hammond harrumphed and just mentioned the issue bluntly: “I noticed some flaws in your plans. The first, when you are planning on stalking Kagami, how are you going to track her down? She only appears when stealing treasure from every spot on the world. The second is, how are you going to kill Kagami? She is truly a women, being more than able of defending herself, plus you didn’t manage to mark her as a target, plus even if you would, it wouldn’t even matter. You said it yourself, she is a logia and harming logias in the regular way is impossible.”

Needing to admit those flaws, Decken stroke his chin and came to a conclusion: “That’s true, turning into wind is the perfect method of avoiding all sorts of projectiles but there has to be a weakspot, nobody is absolutely invincible! The tracking down issue? There is a simple solution, her advance notices! They’re almost always made public before the actual heist! I just use the quick-travel ability of my precious Flying Dutchman to be there when she’s there, too!”

He then finished it with a final monologue, dedicated to his new beloved: “Listen my Kagami! We will realize our mutual love one day! It’s destiny Kagami, you don’t have a choice! You will marry me!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy start into the new year with finally Chapter 10 and the appearanche of the first real antagonist.  
> Man this was a long and fun chapter, especially because Kagami and Decken were more of a comedy dou most of the time. Their interactions are really fun to write. Their relationship actually could've been really well but no Decken the creeper had to screw it up and Kagami has no idea to this point what's coming for her.


End file.
